


grow as we go

by mildkat



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Aged-Up Character(s), Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, Alternate Universe - College/University, Angst with a Happy Ending, Established Kozume Kenma/Kuroo Tetsurou, Fluff, Getting Together, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Strangers to Lovers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-28
Updated: 2021-01-29
Packaged: 2021-03-10 17:07:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 32,070
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28390644
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mildkat/pseuds/mildkat
Summary: Hinata and Kageyama never cross paths in high school, but years later, at the campus coffee shop. Now, while on their separate paths, they approach the brink of something new.-Or: books, baggage, and a loving character study.
Relationships: Hinata Shouyou & Kozume Kenma, Hinata Shouyou & Kuroo Tetsurou, Hinata Shouyou/Kageyama Tobio, Kozume Kenma/Kuroo Tetsurou
Comments: 78
Kudos: 138





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> hello friends! I have been working on this fic, on and off, for a long, long time, and I'm so thrilled to share it with you. this is my love letter to my own university experience, and my two all-time favourite fic genres. and of course, to kagehina and kuroken. 
> 
> I also want to thank [kareofbears](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kareofbears/pseuds/kareofbears), my steadfast beta and most trusted reader. without her, this would just be idea on my notes app. 
> 
> this is fully written and beta'd. I will be posting new chapters every mondays and thursdays. I hope you will join me in this journey! ❤️
> 
> please enjoy x

“There he is!” Hinata beams as Kuroo enters the apartment. Kenma looks up from his Switch next to Hinata on the couch and stays quiet. 

Kuroo throws out a crooked, bashful smile as he’s toeing off his shoes. “So you saw?” 

“Did I _see_?” To further emphasize, Hinata smacks the pile of newspapers on the coffee table, standing two feet tall. “We demanded more copies!” 

Kuroo’s eyes widen, but he smiles for real. He quickly kisses the top of Kenma’s head, but leers at him afterwards. “‘We?’”

Kenma rolls his eyes. “I helped Shouyou carry them across campus.” He shoves Kuroo’s shoulder and mutters, “Congratulations.” 

“Come, look at you,” Hinata says, taking a copy and shoving it at Kuroo’s chest. Kuroo flops on the couch between him and Kenma, and the two of them peer over his shoulder as he takes in the front page: _BLOCKED AND LOADED: KUROO TETSUROU WOWS THE VOLLEYBALL SCENE_. The title is splayed across a full splash of Kuroo midair during a block, the image perfectly capturing the volleyball whipping back from Kuroo’s arms and flying down towards the ground. 

“Page six!” Hinata prompts.

Kuroo laughs, but Hinata notices a blush is starting to creep up his neck. For someone who acts like a haughty douchebag, Kuroo is annoyingly down-to-earth. When he flips to his feature, they’re greeted by another _immensely cool_ picture, this time a candid of Kuroo talking to a teammate. 

“Did you actually not know that this shot was being taken?” 

Kuroo snorts. “Of course I did. They told me to look like we’re talking ‘battle strategy.’ I think we were talking about how awkward it was to pose like that.” He slings an arm around Kenma’s shoulder, pulling him towards his chest. “You could have taken it better.” 

Kenma rolls his eyes, but smiles slightly. He nudges Kuroo. “Go ahead and read it. I was waiting ‘til you were home. Read it to me.” 

Now bashful again, Kuroo clears his throat and begins to read: 

_”Even to the untrained eye, Kuroo Tetsurou exudes the build of a star volleyball player. Impossibly long and lean, his 187 centimetres is listed as among the tallest in the league. The team’s impressive season last year have brought high hopes for the upcoming tournament. Under their new captain’s leadership, a university championship—the first in nearly a decade—does not seem far off._ Okay, I can’t keep reading this out loud. It’s humiliating.” Kuroo covers his face with the paper, slouching forward into his lap. 

“Oh, look who’s suddenly Mr. Humble,” Hinata says, making Kenma chuckle. “At least read this part, it’s my favourite.” His index finger stabs a paragraph near the end of the page. 

Kuroo sighs, but reads it nonetheless. _”Kuroo-san is fiercely private, but last year, he made history by being the first openly-gay volleyball captain in the university’s history. When asked about what it’s like, he had this to say: ‘I stand on the shoulders of any athlete who had to hide their identity in the past, who played the sport because they loved it. It’s much more about them than it is about me, and much more about the team that I get to play with. It didn’t always feel like it, but I’m stupidly lucky.’”_ Kuroo takes a breath after finishing the paragraph, then adds, “Huh. This is much less awkward when I was saying it during the interview.”

“So cool,” Hinata sighs. “You’re making us queers proud.” 

“Speak for yourself,” Kenma mutters. He hugs his knees to his chest. 

“Aw, can’t we ignore the unjust institutional bias towards athletics in universities at the expense of other student programs and its historic treatment of marginalized communities for a moment and be proud of your boyfriend?” 

Kenma looks at him with disgust. “No.” 

“Ah, well it was worth a shot.” He plants a sloppy kiss on Kenma’s cheek. “At least admit I look good in the photo.” 

Kenma gives him a cool, even stare. “You look good in the photo.” 

“And?” 

He purses his lips and glances to the side. “And I’m proud of you.” 

Kuroo kisses the top of his head and mutters against his hair, “Thank you.” 

“Okay, okay, enough of that.” Hinata claps once. “Let’s celebrate!” 

“ _Eh?_ I’m tired.” 

“Don’t be a loser. We’re going out. I already convinced Kenma.” 

When Kuroo looks at him suspiciously, Kenma smiles. “Don’t be a loser.” 

“No excuses. None of us have class tomorrow until one. You know, you’re only allowed to brag about this for like a day. After that, you’ll just be a douche. I’ll even let you pick the place.”

Kuroo raises an eyebrow. “What about Deadline?” 

Hinata and Kenma give him a simultaneous glare. Hinata replies, “Of all the bars in the city to celebrate your big night, you want to go to the _campus pub?_ The douchiest place on earth?” 

“Yes.” Kuroo laughs. “I wanna invite the team, and that’s our usual.” 

“You’re a dick,” Kenma mutters. “But if that’s the one you really want, we will go to Deadline.” 

Kuroo cranes his neck to sneer at Hinata. “And what about you, bud? Down to endure straight man culture and get drunk with me?” 

Hinata crosses his arms and fumes, but eventually gives in. “Fine. Whatever. But only because I’m a good friend and I’m choosing to believe you’re not doing this just to spite us. And I’m gonna complain the whole time.” 

“I expect nothing less.” 

-

Other than the seedy bathroom on the sixth floor of the library, Deadline is Hinata’s most hated place on campus. It has a strong reputation for the athletes’ hangout spot, which would already make him wrinkle his nose, but having this many big and brawny dudes in a place that has some sort of Happy Hour seven hours a day makes him avoid that place with a fifty-feet radius. 

“Do you remember a single one of my teammate’s names, Hinata?” Kuroo asks him as they walk in the darkness towards the obnoxious neon sign. 

“Sure I do. There’s Turnip-head, Broccoli-head, and Kogane.” 

“Wonderful. You know a whole person on my team.” 

“How come you’re not testing Kenma?” 

“Because I know them. But I think Kindaichi and Ogano would kind of like those nicknames.” 

“And that’s how I’m gonna get beat up and die at the grossest place in the world.” 

“Hush. The guys love you.” Kuroo grips the door. “Now behave. And you have to have fun.” 

Hinata huffs. “Roger that.” 

As the three of them pass the swinging doors to enter the bar at around nine-thirty, Hinata is hit with the smell of beer and Axe. The walls are lined with a horrendous mixture of sports paraphernalia and pinup art that can’t be hidden by the dim lighting. Before Hinata can turn to Kenma and make fun of the wall art, he hears a chorus of whoops and cheers when they see Kuroo. 

“The man of the hour!” Turnip-head greets them. He switches his voice to a screeching falsetto, “Can I get your autograph?” 

Another one stands up—Tora? Taro? Hinata’s pretty sure it’s Tora—and joins in. “Kuroo-senpai! Do your best out there!” 

“Alright, alright, you dicks,” Kuroo laughs. He slaps the two of them on the back and settles into their table. 

“Hinata! Kenma!” Kogane leans forward to smile at each of them. “It’s been too long!” 

Hinata can feel himself smiling. He’d hold his nose and hang out with Kuroo’s volleyball friends every once in a while, but he never had to pretend with Kogane. His unironic enthusiasm was always refreshing to him. “It has. How are you?” 

“Oh, you know. I’m getting better with the finger workouts, but I still bite my nails. I don’t think it matters, but apparently it does. I’ve grown five centimeters this semester. Oh, and I’m going dry for a month! I’m gonna have a healthy glow when it’s all over. But enough of that!” He claps his hands together. “Let’s get you two a drink! Come on, big shot.” Kuroo is busy talking to the other guys, but Kogane tugs on his elbow. 

Kuroo stands up, his head almost hitting the pot lights hanging from the ceiling, and leans back down to Kenma and Hinata. “Beers?” 

“Can I get a pilsner?” Hinata asks. 

“I’ll get one too.”

Kuroo rolls his eyes. “So two pilsners for the geriatrics. Coming right up.” He goes off to the bar with Kogane. 

“Kenma, you better be ready to have a celebrity boyfriend,” Tora sneers. “Keep an eye on your man.” 

Kenma’s lip quirks upward. “Good. Someone take that loser away from me. No one responded to my Craigslist ads.” 

Tora laughs, and another one—Hinata guesses he’s the Libero, just ‘cause he’s the shortest—pipes up. “Nah, no one would try anything if they actually read the article.” He makes his voice sharp and commanding and stretches his spine, in a clear attempt to impersonate Kuroo, “I’m devoted to my partner and not interested in anyone else, I’m a gentlemen from Ye Olden Days and would never _dare_ glance upon anyone else, much less a...” he mimes an exaggerated shudder, “a woman!” 

Behind him, Kuroo smacks him in the head. “You sure talk a lot from someone who can’t get a girlfriend for yourself, Yahaba.” He puts two glasses of pilsner in front of Hinata and Kenma. 

Tora gets up and lifts his drink in the air. “Cheers to our captain! A block in the streets...” 

“...and a cock in the sheets!” Turniphead finishes. Hinata cringes at the toast, but his chest nevertheless warms at how happy Kuroo seems. They all lift their drinks and clink together. 

Despite his steady flow of complaints muttered to Kenma throughout the night, Hinata begrudgingly realizes he was having fun. Kogane brought a tray of shots, which he somehow convinced both him and Kenma to down. 

“Ugh, oh god, is this tequila?” Hinata shuts his eyes in disgust. “Where’s the lime?” 

“Oh, don’t tell me you’ve never tried a Redheaded Slut before?” Broccoli-head laughs. 

“A _what?_ ” 

“Straight culture is baffling,” Kenma says. A small splash of red is starting to creep up his cheeks, and he’s looking thoughtfully at the empty shot glass. “But that wasn’t bad.”

“Jagermeister and schnapps,” Kuroo leans heavily on Hinata’s shoulder and downs another one. He speaks again without missing a beat. “The cranberry juice makes it fucking delicious.” 

Hinata shoves Kuroo away with his arm, and Kuroo just leans the other way, resting his head on Kenma’s shoulder. Hinata wonders if Kenma’s gonna shove him back, swinging Kuroo like a tispy metronome, but Kenma lets him stay. Hinata can spot a small smile tugging at the side of his Kenma’s lip as Kuroo nuzzles his shoulder. 

The others continue to down drinks and buzz around each other, but Hinata can’t look away from his two best friends. He’s lived with them for over a year, and has known them for even longer. He loves them, and they love him, and it works. Kuroo and Kenma love each other like the way you love your best friend, because that’s exactly what they are. He used to tease them in the past when they showed any real displays of affection, because it was just _that_ rare, but at this point, he doesn’t even notice it anymore. 

Mostly. 

Sometimes, he looks at them and starts to ache. He sees the way they hold hands below their tiny dining table, the way Kenma falls asleep on Kuroo’s chest when they’re watching TV, or at this moment, as he watches Kenma absentmindedly play with Kuroo’s hair as they whisper to each other in the middle of this rowdy group, their conversation lost on everyone in the bar except them. They’re his best friends, the two sides of his lungs, but they’re each other’s heart. And Hinata can’t help but feel like his own heart is starting to atrophy, shrivelling up inside his chest and spreading to the rest of his body. 

He grabs another shot from the tray, downs it, and chases it with three gulps of pilsner. He can feel everything he’s shoved down start to come back up, thick bile bubbling up his throat. 

Hinata scrapes back his chair. “Bathroom,” he announces, before realizing that there was no one to tell. 

Walking in a straight line to the back of the bar turns out to be a feat of focus and coordination, which Hinata apparently has run out of. He bangs his hip on a table and nearly runs into a wall before swinging open the bathroom door. He only feels a little degraded as he kneels on the tiles, hangs his head over the toilet, his eyes shut tight, and throws up. 

So much for celebration. 

He crawls back up towards the sink and swishes water around his mouth (like that would do anything). In his drunken haze, he stares at his reflection and doesn’t recognize himself. His eyes, which were bright, are now clouded and sagging. His skin, which was fair, is now flushed and sweaty. 

Is this it? Is this all he was, all he ever will be? 

He closes his eyes again and shuts it down—whatever all of _this_ is. He wills himself to skid this spiral to a halt; there’s a lot of things he’s failed to do, but this was one thing he can manage. For now.

He splashes water in his face and walks back into the floor. This time, he can walk perfectly fine. 

It’s dark enough that he doesn’t see Kuroo practically jump him near the bar. “There you are!”

“I was just in the bathroom.” Hinata hesitates, guilt creeping in his chest, before adding, “I think I’m gonna take o—”

“Drink.” Kuroo interrupts him. He shoves a glass into his hand. 

“Oh, no, I was just gonna—”

“It’s water, you party animal.” He watches Hinata gratefully chug the whole glass. “Do you have your jacket? Let’s head out.” 

“What? I can go by myself. You should stay. It’s your night, remember?”

Kuroo rolls his eyes, but he’s smiling. “Nah. Kogane just took off his shirt, so that’s as good a cue as any. And Kenma’s falling asleep.” 

Hinata grins. One half of his lungs. “Okay.”

Kuroo, bless his heart, mostly handles the goodbyes. He waves off the loud chorus of protests as he drapes his jacket over Kenma and gently nudges him to stand. He wraps an arm around him, and together, the three of them push through the doors. 

Hinata inhales the cold night air and immediately starts to feel better. After two steps outside, however, Kuroo stumbles and slumps down on Kenma. “Oh, wow. I’m drunk.” 

Kenma clicks his tongue and clutches Kuroo’s waist. “Too many red-headed sluts will do that to you.” 

The door bursts open again, and half the team poke their heads out. Kogane waves with his whole arm, like he’s greeting the Titanic. “Hinata! Come visit us at practice, yeah? I know Kenma gets lonely watching by himself,” Kogane smiles. 

Hinata tries to ignore the way his throat is closing up. He swallows it down and smiles. “Yeah, maybe.” He starts walking backwards towards Kuroo and Kenma, itching to end the conversation. 

Turnip-head pops up behind him. “Or even our games! Athletic events are great hunting grounds. You’ll never know what could happen,” he winks. 

This time, Hinata’s chuckle is genuine. It could be the Jagermeister, but he’s starting to see the people that Kuroo talks so fondly about at home. “Thanks for the tip. Goodnight!” Before they could say anything else, Hinata turns on his heel and half-runs towards poor Kenma, who’s starting to walk at a forty-five degree angle from supporting Kuroo’s weight. He grabs Kuroo’s other arm, and it’s a six-legged race back to their apartment. 

Hinata and Kenma shove Kuroo onto the bed. “You think he’ll be okay?” Hinata asks. 

“Yeah,” Kenma replies. He pulls his lilac hair into a loose bun and removes Kuroo’s jacket. 

“Well, goodnight.” Hinata starts to close their door behind him, when Kenma speaks again. 

“Hey.” 

When Hinata turns to look at him, Kenma’s eyes are wide open and are staring at him with full force. A beat passes before he asks, “Do you wanna talk about it?” 

Hinata doesn’t bother playing dumb. “Not really.” 

At that, Kenma’s eyes soften. “Alright. Goodnight, Shoyou.”


	2. Chapter 2

There’s maybe something sad about the boy.  
Walking down the street,  
His eyes look out at me from people that I meet,  
I can’t believe it’s true  
But when I’m blue  
In some strange way I’m glad about the boy. 

-Noel Coward, “Mad About the Boy.'

— 

Mornings are a reset.

Hinata only felt moderately gross when he blinked his eyes open the next day. The pale light of dawn almost lulled him back to sleep, but he managed to swing his legs off the bed, trip over his clothes and shoes from last night, and down a glass of water. After dry-heaving in the shower, he began to feel better when he finished his toast. 

This is fine. 

He’s making another one, spreading the butter towards each corner, when Kuroo and Kenma’s door softly swings open. 

Hinata gives him a small smile. “How are you feeling?” 

Kuroo’s eyes are barely open. He holds up a finger, mouths one second, grabs the biggest glass at the top of the cupboard, fills it with the tap, and chugs it down. Hinata’s mildly impressed that no water drips down from his lips. Kuroo’s gulps are so massive that he’s half worried he’s gonna choke. Kuroo heaves for air when he puts the empty glass down. “Good. You?” 

“Fine.” He offers Kuroo his half-eaten breakfast. “Are you hungover?” 

Kuroo takes it and shoves the whole thing in his mouth. “Nah. I’m gonna go on a run.” He pauses, breaking eye contact. He busies himself with refilling his glass while he asks, “You wanna come with?” 

Hinata’s chest only tightens a little bit when he replies, “Maybe next time. But thank you.” 

Kuroo nods and turns back around. “You gonna study?” Hinata nods, and Kuroo adds, “I’ll look for you after my run, if you want. We can check if Kenma’s still sleeping after lunch.” 

“Has anyone told you that you’re an enabler?” 

“It’s sleep, Shouyou. Not heroin.” 

If Deadline is Hinata’s most hated spot on campus, Renaissance Coffee is his favourite. With two Starbuckses on campus and with this one positioned a block behind the Humanities building, he rarely sees more than five other people camped out to study there for the day. A narrow wooden bookshelf stands at the corner, with beat-up paperbacks lining the shelves. It’s supposed to be a communal library-type thing—you give a book, you take one. Hinata donated a few of his own books into their collection at the beginning of his undergrad, and he likes to check to see if anyone has picked them up. 

So far, his books—or most of the books on that shelf—haven’t moved an inch. 

He sits on his usual spot, the cafe’s biggest table and pressed against the window, and sips on his iced London Fog. Even though it’s November, he always takes his drinks iced. He’d do anything to avoid burning. 

He pulls out his books and piles them on the table. Two thousand words on The Tragical History of Doctor Faustus, due Friday. Today is Wednesday, but the early modern text just swirls around his vision and makes his mind wander somewhere else, somewhere far away from Beezlebub and Mephostopheles. Without knowing how much time is passing, he continues to sit at the wooden chair, pretending to read the text and writing down “ideas”, as the ice waters down the lavender and earl grey. 

After some time, however, he starts to feel for Faustus. With all the power in the world, he uses it to summon a figure to love. Hinata thinks about that; how even with wielding all the power the devil can give you, all you’ll want in the end is Helen of Troy. His hand is now flurrying across his notebook, his chicken scrawl blurting out the ways in which he’s somehow feeling empathy towards the literal symbol for blunder. 

His mind gets interrupted when he hears someone ask from the front of the cafe, “Excuse me, are those books for sale?” 

He looks up in surprise, and to zero in on the voice. He’s tall— _really_ tall—with black hair, round eyes, and with a backpack from the university athletics department. The same one that Kuroo uses. 

He’s holding a small to-go cup, and currently pointing towards the wall behind Hinata—the wall where the bookshelf stands. He is also very cute. There’s something about the openness in his eyes, the genuine nature of his cadence that makes Hinata unable to look away. 

Hinata watches the barista—Sugawara, he’s come to know all the staff’s names in all the times he comes—quickly shakes the surprise off his face and smiles, “No, it’s meant to be a community library! Please feel free to grab one, if you’d like.” 

“Ah, I see. Thank you.” The guy turns and starts to walk towards Hinata’s side of the cafe, which makes Hinata immediately glance back down his work. His eyes sneak up when he passes, trying and failing to spot a name written on his cup. He weighs the risks and rewards of fully turning around to watch him browse the shelf, and ends up watching the water ring left by his drink. 

His phone vibrates, and he pulls it out of his pocket to see a text from Kuroo. 

_ >>Kenma’s up. Are you at Renaissance?_

_ >>Yeah_

_ >>We’ll be there in a bit_

_ >>Ok_

Just as he hits send, the guy walks past him one more time, gives Suga a small wave, and swings open the door. From his spot by the window, Hinata can see a small paperback tucked underneath his arm. _Night Sky With Exit Wounds_ by Ocean Vuong. 

Any other person wouldn’t have been able to recognize the book from the distance, but Hinata wasn’t any other person. He was the previous owner of that book. 

He immediately stands up and walks over to the shelf. He didn’t seem to take anything else—definitely not his other books. He can feel his heart pick up the pace, the blood thrumming along his veins. 

He wills it to calm the fuck down. It’s just a boy who picked up a free book. 

_His_ book. 

A _cute_ boy.

A cute boy picked _his book._

A cute boy picked _him._

He leans over and thumps his forehead on the edge of the shelf. _Get a grip._

He walks to his table and considers his options. 

1\. Wait for him to come back  
2\. Find out who he is before he comes back  
a. Clues to who he is:  
i. Boy  
ii. Cute  
iii. Athletics bag  
iv. Tall  
v. Volleyball? 

That thought makes Hinata’s heart jump again, but not in the way it did earlier. This time, it’s anxiously recoiling within his chest. 

“What a hard worker.” Hinata feels a hand pat his head. He blinks up at Kuroo leering down at him. He sees Kenma at the counter. “It’s rare that I see you so focused on your work.” 

Hinata sticks out his tongue. Nevermind that he wasn’t actually doing work. 

Kuroo settles into a chair in front of him and picks up his copy of _Faustus_. “Is this the one where the wife gets smothered by a pillow?” 

“That’s Othello. And this is Marlowe, not Shakespeare.” 

“Sorry, what was that? I fell asleep for a second.” 

Hinata snatches back his book and makes a face. Kenma approaches their table with a loaded tray: two drinks and two sandwiches. Kuroo settles an arm at the back of Kenma’s chair, and Hinata takes a half of the sandwich in front of him. 

As he’s taking a bite out of his own turkey and basil on sourdough, Kenma sees Faustus on the table and wrinkles his nose. “Why are you even taking Early Modern Lit?” 

Hinata groans. “I don’t even remember. I think it has an early exam. But I don’t mind this one.” 

“You could be reading Baldwin with me all semester, but evening classes are just _so_ unthinkable for you.” 

“I refuse to go to class at six pm, Kenma. Only weird people take evening classes.” 

“He has a point,” Kuroo says with a mouthful of food. “And it makes you miss some of our games. I hope the critical race theory is worth it.” 

“It is.” Kenma deadpans. “Better than whatever Eurocentric slogfest Shouyou is reading.”

“Oh, Kuroo.” Hinata begins, but stops himself. He doesn’t want to tell them about Mr. Paperback. Not yet. Kuroo is looking at him expectantly. “Are those athletic backpacks standard issue for all of the university’s sports teams?” 

“Yeah, why? Do you want one?” 

Hinata makes a gagging face. “I’d rather use Natsu’s Randoseru.” 

Kuroo shoves the rest of his sandwich into his mouth. “Suit yourself.” He starts eating the vegetables that Kenma picks off his own plate. 

So Mr. Paperback doesn’t necessarily play on the volleyball team. Hinata lets himself hope that this is the case. Literally any sport, any random affiliation with the athletics department. Just not this one. 

When he goes back to Renaissance the next day, he tells himself it’s because he has more work to do. Even if he’s finished most of his essay already. After all, you can never proofread something too many times. 

But when he swings open the door, greets Sugawara with a smile, his eye immediately wanders to the back of the cafe. Where he sees _Night Sky_ placed neatly back on, and another book taken away. _The Sympathizer._

“He was just here. Swapped books and got a coffee to go.” Hinata snaps his head back to Sugawara, who gives him a wink as he’s wiping the counter. Before he can try to play dumb, Sugawara adds, “he’s cute, isn’t he?” 

Hinata tries to stifle his blush. “I was just...” He blinks and starts over. “No one’s taken my books before.” 

“I’m sure he can take other things, too. Like your number.” 

HInata rolls his eyes and starts walking towards his spot. “Hilarious.” 

“Yes, I am, but I wasn’t joking.” 

He flops down the chair and unzips his backpack. “Not listening! Trying to study!” 

“Do you still want your usual, lover boy?” 

“...yes please.” 

“One iced London Fog coming up!” 

The next day, when Hinata and Kenma walk into the cafe, Hinata resists looking straight at the bookshelf. He hasn’t told Kenma. This was such a small thing that he wouldn’t even know what to say... 

Yeah, no. That’s a lie. He would tell Kenma everything. There’s just something especially pathetic about all this; pining after a guy whose name he didn’t even know. Whose face he can barely even fully remember. 

“Shouyou.” 

Hinata’s train of thought abruptly halts, and he realizes he was staring blankly into space as Kenma was trying to tell him something. “What?” He blinks. “Sorry. What is it?” 

“I said I was gonna order. Do you want your usual?” 

“Oh, sure. Yes.” 

Kenma sighs. “What is it?” 

Hinata cracks a smile. “Nothing.” This wasn’t technically a lie. As far as any normal person is concerned, this really is wholly inconsequential. 

But Kenma isn’t having it. He rests his face on the back of his hand and simply stares back. 

Hinata slides his eyes to the side. “It’s...not a big deal?” 

Kenma frowns. “Is that the best you can do?” 

Hinata sighs in exasperation and runs his fingers through his hair. “You’re the worst. One of these days, you know, you’re gonna be wrong and there really will be nothing on my mind.” 

Kenma rolls his eyes, but Hianta can spot a small smile tugging at the corner of his lips. He stays quiet, waiting for him to get on with it. 

“It’s just...It’s a guy.” 

Kenma raises an eyebrow. “Oh?” 

“Yeah.” 

After a beat, Kenma deadpans, “that’s it?” 

“Yeah. Pretty much.” He tugs on his hair again and looks down at the table. “I saw him pick up one of my books from the community shelf the other day. And then he took another one the next day. And he’s cute. And tall. And...yeah.” He hates it. He hates putting his feelings, half-baked and bubbling over the edge, into words that other people have to understand. He hates being twenty-one and feeling like he has the heart of a child. 

“Shouyou.” Kenma says after a beat. He nudges Hinata with his foot under the table, which urges Hinata to look back up at him. When he does, Kenma’s smiling. “That’s great.” 

Hinata can feel his face get hot. “Agh! You sound like a mom trying to be cool.” 

“And you sound like a teenager with pent-up issues. Which,” He tilts his head thoughtfully, “I guess is true enough.” 

Hinata barks out a laugh. “But that’s it. I don’t know anything else about him except that he picked up _Night Sky_ and put it back the next day.” 

Kenma looks surprised. “Really? He has good taste.” 

“Ugh, I know!” Hinata buries his face within his folded arms. “He must have finished it in one night. He’s probably, like, really smart.” 

“Okay, let’s not take it too far.” 

“How many athletes do you know read _poetry_ , Kenma? And Kuroo doesn’t count. He only reads it ‘cause he’s gay and he wants you to love him.” 

“Wait.” Kenma ignores the last part of what Hinata just said. “He’s an athlete?” 

Shit. “Yeah. He was wearing an athletics backpack when I saw him.” 

He raises an eyebrow again. “And you left that part out because...?”

“Because I’m afraid he’ll be on the volleyball team.” Hinata can feel his chest constrict with anxiety. “And if he is, I don’t think I can...” He trails off, breaking eye contact. 

Kenma takes his hand and squeezes it once before letting it go. “I won’t tell Kuroo, if you don’t want me to.” A pause. “Someday, you’re going to have to deal with it.” 

Still staring at the table, Hinata nods slightly. “Yeah. Yeah, I know.” He drops the subject, hoping Kenma will let him. “He picked up _The Sympathizer _the next day.”__

____

____

Kenma, god bless his soul, lets him. “Impressive. At least we know he’s not basic.”

“You’re not even an English major! You don’t have to endure two years of Hemingway and Fitzgerald before finally getting to study texts you actually like.” 

“Every discipline is like that, Shouyou. You just have to recognize the flaws in the field you choose, but take the tools you get from it to enhance your own education.” 

“How very Sociology of you.” Hinata sighs and slumps back into his chair. “I just wish I knew more about him.”

“There are ways to find out more about a person.” 

“You mean you can stalk him online for me?” 

“No. I meant talking to him. Like a normal person.” 

“Ugh.” 

“He’s a brilliant literary mind, right?” When Hinata just rolls his eyes, Kenma says, “So he’ll come back tomorrow.” 

He didn’t. 

He wasn’t there the day after, either. 

Or the day after that. 

“That’s it. He’s never gonna come back and I’ll never see _The Sympathizer_ again.” Hinata pouts from where he’s lying upside down from the couch. 

“It’s been three days. And that book’s really long.” 

Hinata considers this. He strains his neck slightly to look up at Kenma, making tea in the kitchen. “Would I be a pathetic loser if I came back again tomorrow?” 

“Yes.” 

“You’re an awful friend.” 

“But you’re still gonna do it, right? That’s reason alone. And besides,” he emerges from the kitchen and places two teacups on the coffee table. “You’re a pathetic loser to begin with.” He pats Hinata’s head and grabs the remote. 

Hinata frowns indignantly, even though Kenma can’t see him. From his upside-down perch, he watches the Animal Crossing: New Horizons home screen come to life on their TV. “Would you come with me?” 

“I have to finish a paper tonight, so I’ll be sleeping in tomorrow. Now shush. Isabelle’s giving the town update.” 

There he is, in all his hundred and seventy centimetre glory, browsing the bookshelf after days of absence. 

With his chest thumping, Hinata tries to figure out a way to approach him. It’s proving to be an added challenge, however, that he’s observing him, browsing his books, in all his hundred and seventy centimetre glory, through the window from outside the coffee shop. Like a Dickensian orphan. 

Too soon, Mr. Paperback picks up his coffee cup, nods at Sugawara and strides out the door, without so much as a glance to the crazy man standing outside the window. All Hinata could do was blink and watch him walk into the crisp late morning air, with _Native Speaker_ —one of his favourites—tucked under his arm. 

He tries not to let his shoulders sag in defeat and shame as he pushes the cafe door open. He could already see Sugawara looking at him, with no doubt a quip ready on his tongue. 

As soon as the door opens wide enough, though, Sugawara’s eyes widen and he’s gesturing for Hinata to leave the cafe. “What are you doing?” he all but yells at Hinata. “Go! Talk to him!” 

“Wait, what?” 

“Go! Before he gets further away!” 

From pure confusion and slight fear at Suga’s aggression, Hinata starts to back away. He stops and turns back around when he realizes, “I don’t even know his name!” 

“It’s Kageyama! Now _go!_ ”

He’s shocked enough by Sugawara’s forcefulness that without another word, Hinata rams his shoulder against the door, stumbles back out of the cafe, and starts running towards him. Suddenly, he’s all adrenaline and purpose, the October air cutting across his cheeks and whooshing around his lungs. He’s almost out of Hinata’s line of sight, but he can see him. Head down, walking downhill towards the library. Mr. Paperback. 

_Kageyama._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you so much for reading! comments/kudos would be a dream, and please say hi/reblog this fic on [my tumblr](https://mildkatfics.tumblr.com/) if you'd like.


	3. Chapter 3

a swarm of want you wear  
like a bridal veil but you don’t  
deserve it: the boy &  
his loneliness the boy who finds you  
beautiful only because you’re not  
a mirror because you don’t have  
enough faces to abandon you’ve come  
this far to be no one...” 

— Ocean Vuong, excerpt from “Because it’s Summer”

—

**one week earlier**

“Ocean Vuong?” Kageyama jumps when he hears his captain’s voice so close to his ear. When he turns, he sees Kuroo peering over his shoulder to look at his book. He cranes his neck to look at the cover. “I knew it. _Night Sky with Exit Wounds._ My partner loves that book.” 

“I see.” Being a new player on a volleyball team would cause Kageyama to feel antsy in normal circumstances, but having a captain like Kuroo—someone who just seemed so open and genuine around everyone he meets, especially when it comes to his queerness—that Kageyema feels like every word coming out of his mouth is awkward and inauthentic. Like he couldn’t meet him at his level. 

Kuroo must have sensed his discomfort, because he stands back up and starts rummaging around his locker. “I didn’t know you liked poetry, Kageyama.” 

Kageyama closes the book and tucks it carefully away in his gym bag. “Just trying something new, I guess.” He glances back at him. “Do you like poetry, Kuroo-san?”

Kuroo swings his locker shut and grins at him. “I’m more of an actions type of man.” He slaps him on the shoulder. “Now let’s go. That Wednesday five-k isn’t gonna run itself.” 

Later that day, he continues to read. He doesn’t understand much of this, if at all. He squints at the page—the sun has properly set in his dorm room and he can’t be bothered to get up and turn on the light—and tries to read the excerpt one more time:

_I said yes because you asked me  
to stay. Maybe we pray on our knees because god  
only listens when we’re this close  
to the devil. There is so much I want to tell you._

Even when he has no clue what’s going on, he can feel something stirring inside of him. Slithering out of his chest, poking and prodding his lungs. He’s pretty sure he doesn’t like this feeling. 

_He_ always said to embrace the feeling. 

_If this doesn’t make you feel anything, you’re just not thinking hard enough._

The voice floats in his head like an intrusive breeze. He shuts it down. 

It’s now fully dark in the room. He can see the moon glow softly above the trees. He turns on his phone’s flashlight and props it against the nightstand. It hurts to contort his body so that the light can reach his book, but this is fine. Better than getting up to turn on the light. 

His gaze drifts to the box at the corner of the room. He feels his shoulder crack when he flips the page. He ignores all of it. 

Onto the next one. 

At practice the next day, he was taking extra care of his neck and shoulders during warm up—gently rolling his head up and down, side to side—and Kuroo notices. “Did you hurt yourself?” 

Kageyama slowly lifts his head to look at him. Kuroo is jamming his knee to push Kindaichi’s stretch forward. Kindaichi yelps out a complaint, but Kuroo ignores him. “No, I just slept on it weirdly.” 

“Did you get to the poem about riding bikes in the summer?” 

That takes Kageyama by surprise. “You’ve read it, Kuroo-san?” 

He lifts his knee and pulls Kindaichi up. Kindaichi is glaring at him, but Kuroo doesn’t break eye contact with Kageyama. “Like I said, my partner loves it.” Before Kageyana can respond, Kuroo claps his hands and calls out to the rest of the team. “Alright, dicks! Receiving drills!” He smiles at Kageyama and jogs towards their coach, with Kageyama’s question still lingering on his lips: 

_What’s it like? To enjoy something with the person you love?_

**present day**

Someone is following him. 

He’s walking to the library and someone is following him, and he doesn’t know if he should be afraid. 

When he was little, his mother would make him watch documentaries of how children get abducted when they were alone. In those movies, it was always at night, and it was always a big, burly man trailing a tiny, adorable child. He’s trying to remember the things the documentary advised: 

1\. Call for help  
2\. Run away  
3\. Stand your ground and fight 

However, he’s pretty sure that none of these apply to his current situation, for a number of reasons: 

1\. He is twenty one years old and a hundred and eighty centimetres tall  
2\. He is in broad daylight, surrounded by fellow students who will call the police on _him_ if he suddenly approaches them for help  
3\. The man following him is not a big, burly predator, but a very cute boy 

He was able to get a good look at him when he stopped to tie his shoes, and he saw the guy abruptly stop in panic and pretend to look at a street lamp. (This was how he figured out he was being followed.) Kageyama supposes that he can still be a predator _and_ be very cute; it just wasn’t in the documentary. 

* 

Hinata has no idea why he ended up _stalking_ Kageyama halfway across campus, like he’s fucking Freddy Kruger. 

They’re getting close to the library, and he’s running out of time. He doesn’t even know what he can do at this point. He’s almost a hundred percent sure Kageyama has noticed him trailing, so he’s probably going to call the police. Or campus security. Or his girlfriend. 

He probably has a girlfriend. 

* 

Just a few more steps to the library, and Kageyama can try to lose him among the shelves. Probably. Hopefully. Unless...

* 

This is now or never. 

“Hi! Hey, excuse me!”

*  
_“Hi! Hey, excuse me!”_

Does he turn around? 

*

Standing at the bottom of the steps, Hinata stares at Kageyama as his hand is on the door handle, still facing away from him. 

He probably won’t turn around. 

A beat passes, and after a moment of agonizing silence Hinata starts to back away. He starts to thank the gods that no one else was around to witness whatever _this_ was, when the library door opens in full force, knocking Kageyama—and everything he’s holding—down the stairs. 

* 

There’s a dull pain on his left hip. And a sharp cut on his elbow. His wrists...his hands...

“Oh my god, are you okay?” Kageyama blinks up at a girl, wide-eyed with panic. He ignores her in favour of inspecting his hands. They seem okay. He rolls both wrists carefully. Both fine, he thinks. 

The girl speaks again. “Sir? Can you hear me?”

He looks at her and replies, “Yes, I think so. Where’s my...” 

A different voice perks up. “Here, I have your phone.” Kageyama turns to see the cute stalker standing awkwardly over him and the girl. He hesitates before adding, “I have your book, too. Sorry, but, your coffee...” 

Kageyama follows his line of vision to see his coffee cup, still mostly full, toppled over the concrete, dripping down the steps. He stands up, ignoring the pain on his hip. “Thank you.” Slowly wearing off the daze of his fall, he starts to feel the embarrassment of the moment. He’s itching to get inside the library and forget this ever happened, but he realizes that the stalker—the boy— is still clutching his belongings. “Um. Can I have that back?” 

He chokes out a strained laugh. “Yes, of course.” He hands over his phone and his book. “Are you sure you’re okay? You just fell down some stairs.” 

“I’m fine. Thanks.” Hoping he can’t see the hotness of his cheeks, he turns around to finally enter the library. Just three steps away. Just make it to—

“Hey, wait.” 

Kageyama looks over his shoulder, and he sees him frozen in his spot. With full permission to get a better look, Kageyama decides that he is indeed _very cute._ With the sun behind him, an orange glow surrounds his outline. His wavy orange hair is somehow subdued, his giant eyes approachable. He’s wearing a t-shirt that Kageyama’s pretty sure is a child’s cartoon character, but he makes it work. Paired with a burgundy jacket, black jeans, and glasses perched on his nose, he could even be a teaching assistant. A teaching assistant he wants to look at. The boy speaks again. “Can I...maybe I can get you another coffee.” He gestures to the sad coffee cup still littering the steps, his dark roast just dripping from the concrete. 

Well, that was unexpected. His ogling made it a bit of a struggle to answer. “But you weren’t the one who pushed me.” 

“Yeah, but she left. I think we scared her away.”

Is this weird? Kageyama thinks this is weird. He notices his glasses are a little low on the bridge of his nose. He wants to push it up safely in his face. And maybe fix a few strands of his hair...

The boy speaks again. “We can go to the Starbucks by the Sciences building.” He smiles and runs a hand through his hair, and Kageyama’s chest stutters. 

He forces himself to get a grip. A few other students walk out of the library, throwing annoyed glances at the two people taking up the steps. He starts to feel even more self-conscious. “Thank you, but I’m good. I really have to study.” It was true, but he’s already getting annoyed at himself for acting this way. A cute stranger wants to buy him coffee, and he keeps refusing. He just wants this interaction to end. 

But before he can even turn around, the boy speaks again. “What about tomorrow?” He must see the surprise—or is it confusion? Kageyama is definitely feeling confusion—on his face, because he adds, “If you want. Of course. Would you? Want to?” 

“I would.” He replies, probably a little too quickly. 

His eyes widen, but he smiles. “Great! Good.” He clears his throat, reaches for his back pocket, and pulls out his phone. “Can I get your number? So I can find you again?”

“Of course.” The boy watches Kageyama fiddle with his phone before handing it to him, the new contact page ready for him. He hesitates when typing in his name. _Kageyama Tobio Spilled Coffee? Kageyama Tobio Fell Down the Stairs?_ He leaves it as _Kageyama Tobio_ and hands it back to him. 

“Thanks.” He smiles again. Kageyama wonders if he’s gonna keep having the same reaction whenever this happens. He starts walking backwards, slipping his phone back into his pocket. “I’ll leave you to study, then. Good luck!” He turns around and walks away. Kageyama watches him go, with one hand shoved in that burgundy jacket, and the other holding his phone. He pries his eyes away and— _finally_ enters the library. His phone chimes just as he sits on his usual spot, back corner of the basement. 

_> >Hi, Kageyama Tobio. This is Hinata Shouyou. Good luck studying :-)_

Kageyama ignores the slight trembling in his fingers as he types out a reply. 

_> >Thank you. I’m free tomorrow after 1pm, if you are_

_Like a coward, he switches on Do Not Disturb and throws his phone into his backpack. He will deal with that later. For now, though, he pulls out his Finance textbook and looks at the clock on the wall. It’s 11am now, which gives him about nine hours to prepare for his morning exam the following day._

When he opens his book, lays out his notes, and starts going through the motions of studying, however, his mind keeps drifting back to outside the library.

To the sun glowing around his fair skin. 

The glasses perched on his nose... 

_Hinata Shouyou._

It’s dark by the time he leaves the library. The evening air feels nice against his skin, but the cold wind makes his dry eyes sting. He shuts his eyes in a desperate bid to get moisture, gives up, and pulls out his phone. 

There’s a text from Hinata, from hours ago. 

_ >>Yes, that works! I know I offered Starbucks, but Renaissance is way better. That alright? For 1:30 ish? :D _

__Kageyama smiles and replies._ _

_> >That works._

__Kageyama senses that this is the kind of thing he tells a friend. That someone asked him to get coffee, and he’s excited about it. (Is he excited about it? It’s been so long...) That’s something normal people do, right? Normal people without baggage. Normal people that don’t have to shut down their thoughts like an emergency override, digging his nail into the middle of his palm like he’s doing right now. It passes, and he takes a deep breath._ _

__He feels his stomach growl. He should probably get dinner._ _

__He ignores the aches in both his chest and his gut and walks home._ _

__Fuck Finance._ _

__*_ _

__“So then you asked for his number?”_ _

__Hinata replies with an incoherent noise. It’s the best he could do, given his face is still buried in his hands._ _

__Hinata hears Kenma chew his ramen, swallow, and say, “I have to say, I’m impressed.”_ _

__“You shouldn’t be.” At that, he lifts his head just to look incredulously back at him. “You should be embarrassed. Everyone on campus should be embarrassed on my behalf. I stalked him, led him to bodily harm, tried to ask him out, got _rejected_ , then asked for his fucking phone number. I deserve to be thrown into Deadline with all the sad douchebags who hang out there all the time.” He pouts at his own ramen, still mostly untouched, and swirls the noodles around the bowl. _ _

__“He said yes, didn’t he?”_ _

__“Yeah, but—”_ _

__“Then he wants to see you.”_ _

__“ _Yes,_ but isn’t it worrying that he hasn’t replied to me? It’s been hours.” He flops down on the couch and pouts. _ _

__Kenma sits on the arm of the couch and sighs. “Shouyou. I love you, but you see that this is a toxic spiral you’re going on, right?”_ _

__Hinata tries to pout even harder. Then, he peers back at him, “Do you really love me?”_ _

__Kenma rolls his eyes. “Not indulging you any further.”_ _

_Ding!_

__Hinata looks at Kenma with wide eyes before scrambling to open his phone. “‘That works!’” He shoves the phone in Kenma’s face and takes a deep breath. “I’m good. We’re good.” He avoids looking at Kenma again, although he can practically hear him pursing his lips in disapproval. He picks up the remote. “What do you wanna watch?”_ _


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hi everyone, hope you're doing well and that you're enjoying the story so far xx 
> 
> enjoy!

The new sight, the new wondrous sight!  
The waters round me, turbulent,  
The skies, impassive o'er me,  
Calm in a moonless, sunless light,  
Glorified by intent  
Of holding the day-glory!

— Elizabeth Barett Browning, excerpt from “Sabbath Morning at Sea”

— 

The afternoon sun is shining bright, but the late November winds still make it bitterly cold. Kageyama steps out the lecture hall and grimaces at a particularly strong gust of wind, zipping up his flimsy windbreaker and ignoring the needy growling in his stomach. 

The exam went fine. The key to managing university stress, Kageyama eventually learned, was to cultivate apathy towards your studies. Little by little, until you’re a robot doing the work and handing in assignments and acing exams. The result is a 3.2 average, a beat-up TI-83, and a distaste for every person in the lecture hall. 

Fuck Finance. 

He turns on his phone and sees a text from Hinata.

_> >Hey! I’m a little early but I’m here._

_> >At Renaissance._

He checks the time: 1:18pm. Kageyama is typing out a reply, even though he’s just about to round the corner towards the cafe.

_> >Hope you weren’t waiting long. I’m almost there._

He casts a quick glance up as he’s approaching the cafe, and he sees him standing outside. Head down, one hand scrolling through his phone, his feet slightly shuffling against the rock salt. Kageyama quite literally stops in his tracks. 

Fuck, he’s adorable. 

He’s wearing the same burgundy jacket, but a knit olive scarf hangs loosely around his neck. His black jeans are paired with black Doc Martens, tied with cherry laces. 

Hinata looks up when Kageyama nears him. From this distance, he can see how his cheeks have slightly reddened under the cold. When he smiles at him, Kageyama’s gut constricts. “Hi, Kageyama.”

“Hi, Hinata.” Kageyama shoves his own hands in his pockets. “Were you waiting long?” 

Hinata shakes his head. “No, I pretty much just got here.” 

“You didn’t have to wait out here in the cold.” Leave it to Kageyama to pick fights with this adorable boy in front of him. 

“It would be rude if I didn’t. Bad date 101, you know?” He’s still smiling when he gestures to the door and says, “Shall we?” 

He opens the door and waves Kageyama to go in. Kageyama nearly walks into the glass door.

A date. 

This is a date. 

Did he seriously not properly process this until now? He’s about to go on a date. That hasn’t happened since... 

Since... 

“Oh, hello!” The barista’s voice—Kageyama supposes that this place is too bohemian to have employees wear name tags—shakes him slightly from his panic. “What can I get for you two?” 

“The usual for me, Sugawara-san.” Hinata glances up at him. “Kageyama?” 

He clears his throat before speaking, but his voice still comes out stupid. “Just, uh, a small dark roast, please.” 

“On credit, please.” Hinata says. As he’s finishing up the transaction with the pinpad, Kageyama can’t help but stare at him. His eyelashes. The way he’s effortlessly chatting with the barista—with Sugawara—while he keeps his eyes on the machine. Kageyama keeps up this inventory—his giant eyes, the redness in his cheeks—as he wordlessly follows Hinata to a table near the back. He’s never been a multitasker, which is proven once again when he realizes Hinata is waiting for a reply for something he asked. 

“Sorry, what was that?” He blurts out. _Focus, dipshit._

“I was just asking you how your exam went,” Hinata smiles. He’s unwrapping the scarf from around his neck. _Focus._

“It was good. Brutal, actually. It’s why I’m a little out of it right now, I think.” 

“I kind of thought you were like this all the time,” he replies, resting his head on one hand. 

That almost makes Kageyama smile. “Maybe I am.” He looks straight into Hinata’s eyes, his face slightly tilted on his hand. The apparent ease with which Hinata conducts himself makes Kageyama feel like a distressed bull. His legs feel too long to cross under the table, and he’s suddenly too aware of his hands. He folds them on the table like a high school principal. “What about you? Did you have class today?” 

“Not on Thursdays. I actually spend my free time here. To write papers and read.” 

They both look up when Sugawara approaches their table and places their drinks in front of them. He just winks when they thank him, humming as he goes back behind the counter. 

Hinata keeps talking. “And to see Sugawara-san.” 

“Are you an English major?” Kageyama asks him. 

This seems to surprise Hinata. This, Kageyama realizes, is a good feeling. He wants to catch Hinata off guard again. “Yeah, I’m an English major,” he tucks an orange strand behind his ear. “Is it obvious?” 

Kageyama shrugs. 

“Agh,” Hinata groans, covering his face with his hands. When he looks up, he looks dismayed. “You basically just called me a douche.” 

Kageyama feels his brows furrow. “What? No, I didn’t.” 

“Yes, you did!” He points a small index finger at him as he sips his drink. Kageyama decides to mirror him, his hands finally getting something to do. Hinata keeps talking. “The stereotypical English major is a pretentious know-it-all who wears glasses and loves to hear himself talk.”: 

Kageyama wills himself not to panic. He’s pretty sure this is flirting, but he’s terrified of _insulting_ him. “That’s not true. The stereotypical English major is smart. The rest are what dumb people say to make themselves feel better.” He takes another sip. “The glasses part is true, though.” He tries a small smile. 

Hinata raises an eyebrow. “If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you just complimented me.” 

Kageyama likes this. “I suppose I did.” 

“So what about you?” Hinata leans back with an easy smile on his face. “What’s your major?” 

“You’re not gonna try and guess?” 

Hinata holds out two palms as a sign of surrender. “Clearly, you’re much better at that than I am.”

“I’m majoring in Finance.” 

Hinata makes a face. “I can’t think of any Finance major stereotypes.” 

“I’m sure you can. It’s where all the athletes go. The actual douchebags.” 

He sits up straighter. “Capitalist pigs?” 

“We prefer the term ‘entrepreneur.’” 

“Oh, please spare me,” Hinata grimaces. “None of that talk around Kenma. He’ll forbid me from seeing you again.” 

Well, that’s promising. He’s already talking about introducing him to his friends. _Wait._ Kageyama’s brain backtracks. “You want to see me again?” 

HInata raises an eyebrow. “If you want.” 

Should he make a joke? No, he’ll just screw it up. “I do.”

“Are you forgetting that I was responsible for your accident yesterday?” 

That makes Kageyama chuckle. “You make it sound like I was hit by a bus. And you weren’t even the one who hit me.” 

“Yeah, but we both know that I...” his eyes flit upwards in search of a word. “ _Distracted_ you.” 

By following him across campus and asking him out on a date. Because this is a date. Right? Kageyama’s head is starting to spin. He’s already committed to following Hinata’s lead, but he has fucked up before. Badly. He forces his voice to remain even before he says it. “So this is a date.” 

He watches HInata’s eyes widen, his mouth twisting into a smile. His straw dips out from between his teeth. “Yeah, if that’s okay.” 

“It is.” He takes a sip. “Are you glad I got rammed in front of the library?” 

Hinata laughs. This is also good. All of this is good. “No, of course not. It’s just,” his eyes slide sideways, then back at him. “I also didn't know if you’d be interested.”

“Oh. I’m gay.” 

There’s the laugh again. “That’s good to know. I’m bi.” 

“I wouldn’t have known unless you told me upfront.” 

“I thought you were good at reading people,” HInata sneers. 

Kageyama snatches the back of his head in thought. “Not with everything. Not with a lot of things.” He watches Hinata rest his chin on his two hands. With his entire body leaning towards him, Kageyama feels disarmed. The sun is starting to set outside the window, basking Hinata in a pale red light. “I didn’t even know I was gay until it hit me in the face.” 

Hinata nods. “It took me a while to figure out, too. But I was really lucky. My best friends are queer, too, and having them was everything. They were like my gay godfathers.” 

“I’m glad you had them. I didn’t have anyone to talk to about that stuff, until...” He swallows and takes another sip. “...I got hit in the face.” 

“An old boyfriend?” Hinata asks. HIs face remains kind and inviting, but he’s started tearing up the receipt in tiny little pieces. 

“You could say that.” He doesn’t like where this is going. He takes his mug and takes another sip—only to realize there’s no coffee left. He sets it down. “Kind of a dark topic.” 

Hinata smirks. “Believe me, I know a thing or two about dark topics.” He leans back into his chair and shoves his hands into his jacket. He looks lost in thought and stays quiet. Kageyama is about to ask him what he’s thinking—he somehow feels this irresistible pull to find out—when Hinata speaks again. “Tell you what. I’ll trade you a secret.” The panic that Kageyama is feeling must be showing on his face, because Hinata quickly adds, “We’ll start small. I promise. Deal?” He holds out a hand. 

Without hesitation, Kageyama takes it. “Deal.” He wants to keep holding it, to study how his smaller hand fits inside his, but he lets it fall back on the table. “You go first.” 

Hinata grins. “Alright.” He leans back across the table and gestures for Kageyama to do the same. He looks around the cafe before saying in an almost-whisper, inches away from Kageyama’s face, “I’m hungry. Do you want to get out of here and get dinner?” 

*

Hinata was genuinely getting hungry. And wanted to spend more time with him. Why not kill two birds with one stone? 

It’s been a long time since he’d done that—improvise. Follow his impulse. Do something scary. 

He feels like he’s flying. 

Even the athlete issue can’t break his good spirits. But it still lingers on his mind. He starts to wonder if he could actually ask him. To not pivot away like the coward he was back at Renaissance, but to just get it over with. Finally knowing if he’s a volleyball player can’t be any worse than this... 

“If we’re going to an izakaya on campus, there might be a long line to get in.” Kageyama says, breaking Hinata from his train of thought. When he looks over, he sees a ridge between Kageyama’s eyebrows. He feels the urge to smooth it down with his finger. 

“Oh, don’t worry. This one’s just a little ways past the gate.” 

“What’s it called?” 

The sun has properly set, and the evening darkness has engulfed their walk. Street lamps dot their path, and the campus is buzzing with people. This makes Hinata feel a little bolder. “Why do you ask? Are you worried I’m leading you to my murder shed?”

Kageyama’s lips quirk upward. “My mother did always warn me about secondary locations.” 

“Like, for kidnappers?”

“Yeah.” He zips up his windbreaker when a strong gust rushes past them. “Your chances of survival drop, like, fifty percent if your kidnapper takes you to another place.”

They walk past the gates, and the streets are already getting quieter. Calmer. “So what makes you think I’m not going to do that?” 

When Kageyama looks at him, he’s smiling. Slightly. But it’s there. “This is completely voluntary.” 

Hinata looks down. “Your poor mother. All her knowledge gone to waste.” From this view, even in his chunky Docs and Kageyama’s slim sneakers, his own feet look tiny. “I get you one coffee, and you suddenly let me kidnap you.”

“I guess I’m that easy.” 

Hinata laughs. He can feel a blush start to spread along his cheeks. 

* 

Kageyama could kiss him. Here, right now. It would be romantic, he thinks. Would he have to duck his head down? Should he ask for permission? They would have to stop walking first... 

* 

Hinata wants to ask him. Here, in the quiet, where they have the streets to themselves. If he stops walking, Kageyama would know something was up. 

So he stops walking. 

* 

They’ve stopped walking. 

Kageyama can hear his own chest pounding, reverberating throughout his ears. 

Hinata, he decides, looks lovely in any lighting. 

Kageyama leans in. 

* 

Hinata lets himself blurt out the question. “Are you on the volleyball team?” 

* 

_What?_ “What?” 

* 

“I’m sorry. I can explain later. But...are you?” 

“Uh,” Kageyama steps back and clears his throat. “Yes. Why?” 

Hinata feels his stomach fall. He feels blood rush to his face, ears, and neck. Desperate to get Kageyama’s eyes off him, he starts walking again towards the izakaya, unable to answer his question. They make it about five steps until Kageyama speaks again. “Hinata?”

Embarrassment circles his body, hot and heavy, making him sweat. Discomfort and mild panic start to coat his thoughts, his brain desperately trying to find a way out. He stops walking again. He keeps his eyes to the sidewalk, like the coward that he is, and blurts out an excuse. “Shit, hey, I totally forgot I have an assignment due at midnight tonight, which is in, like,” he grabs his phone and looks at it, although his eyes don’t register anything. Five hours from now! Wow. I really have to go.” 

“Are you alright? Did I say someth—” 

“No, oh my god, no. It’s not that.” Painfully aware of how he’s being, it’s ten times worse to have Kageyama think this was his fault, when this is all him. Panicking when something scary comes up. Melting down when his sadness slips from his control. A Hinata Shouyou special. “Listen, I’m really sorry to do this, but I really have to go. I’ll text you, okay? If you want.” He turns around without waiting for Kageyama’s reply, without looking at him again. 

Hinata starts to walk, not sure where he’s going, but too stubborn and stupid to care.

*

Kageyama watches Hinata walk off, speed up, then jog in the opposite direction, leaving Kageyama standing there. Blinking at the street lamps, reeling from what just happened. 

He did something to screw it up. 

What did he say? He wills himself to remember every word, every movement since they started to walk, but he keeps drawing a blank. It was so _nice._ At least, it was nice for him. 

Is it because he plays volleyball? Hinata had suddenly brought it up, then froze up. Like Kageyama had done something wrong. He probably did. He just wishes he knew what it was. He takes a deep breath, re-orienting himself to his surroundings—he had lost a sense of time and space while he was with him—and he sees the izakaya sign, just another block from where they were standing. The bright sign lets him read the advertising easily: 

_”Pork curry special!”_

He feels his stomach contract in anticipation, but he turns around and starts walking home. 

Kageyama wonders if pork curry was also Hinata’s favourite food. If he likes it with an egg on top, just like him. 

His stomach rumbles again. He ignores it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thanks so much for reading! please let me know what you think in the comments if you'd like. 
> 
> take care, and see you monday!!


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hello friends! hope you're good. thanks for checking out this chapter, and i hope you enjoy it xx

The stars don’t move in the sky,  
the summer hour is like any other summer.  
But the boy walking ahead of you—  
if you don’t speak up he’ll never be the one...

\- Sandra Penno, “The Stars Don’t Move”

— 

“Kuroo-san,” Kageyama starts to say. He tries to ignore the stupid bundle of nerves settling at the bottom of his gut as he approaches him. He can’t help but feel stupid; he had changed much slower in the locker room to try and catch Kuroo alone. Even after he finished putting on a different pair of joggers and shirt, Kuroo was still in conversation with their coaches. He pretended to fiddle with his bag and re-tie his shoes until Kuroo finally started to walk away. 

“Hm?” Kuroo looks up from his phone and turns towards him. They’re standing just in front of the gym exit with the door propped open, with the cool evening air peeking in. 

“I was hoping to talk to you. If you’re not in a hurry.”

“Of course. Let’s get outta here, though, I’m getting sick of this building.” 

They fall into an easy step down the pathway. Kageyama’s not sure where they’re headed, but he appreciates having something for this body to do. “What’s up?” Kuroo starts. “Is your neck acting up again?” 

“No, this isn’t about that.” Kageyama clears his throat. “I was hoping if I could get your advice.” 

“Oh?” Kuroo raises an eyebrow. “How can I be of service?” 

“I went on a date last night.” 

“Hey, that’s great!” He slaps him on the back. “How did it go? Home run?” 

Kageyama doesn’t know what that exactly means, but he can confidently answer either way. “No. It ended abruptly. And I don’t really know why.” 

“Hm,” Kuroo tilts his head up in thought. “They just up and left?” 

Because of that pronoun use, Kageyama takes a second to appreciate Kuroo for the billionth time. The world of athletics has basically conditioned him to expect everyone to think he’s straight, even though it came from well-meaning teammates and colleagues. It’s why Kuroo’s issue of the university paper, when Kageyama didn’t even know their school _had_ a newspaper, is still sitting on Kageyama’s desk. This tiny gesture, probably done without thought, allows his shoulders to relax, like Kuroo has been doing since Kageyama joined his team. “Pretty much. We were about to go into a restaurant, and then he said he suddenly had a paper due, and basically ran away.” He rubs his neck. “It was after I mentioned I played volleyball for this team. But I don’t know.” 

“Then why don’t you find out?” 

That makes Kageyama stop. “Like, text him?” 

Kuroo mirrors him, and replies from a few feet away. “Text, call, messenger pigeon. Whatever it takes.” 

“You don’t think I should give him space?” 

“Space for what? That ‘space’, my friend,” he gestures with his hands. “Is space for him to slip through your long, gifted fingers. You like him, right?” 

Kageyama nods. “But—” 

“But nothing! This is the problem with you kids.” He extends his long arm and jabs a finger towards Kageyama. “If you want it, you go and get it. Messing around and trying to mind read will only lead to pain.” 

He blinks at him. When he puts it like that, it’s pretty much impossible to argue with his logic. 

Kuroo speaks again. “I’d love to chat some more, but I have dinner plans.” He jerks his head behind him. They had walked to the front of an apartment building, just a block from the outskirts of campus. “Keep me updated, yeah?” 

Kageyama nods. “Thank you, Kuroo-san.” 

He waves him off. “You can thank me when you’ve nabbed your lucky man. See you tomorrow, lover boy.” He salutes him, turns around, and walks off. 

* 

“ _Finally!_ ” Hinata yells out from the kitchen as he hears the front door open. He can barely make out Kuroo’s spiky head from where he’s standing, so he pokes out to get a better look. “We were about to eat without you.” 

“Sorry, one of my guys wanted to talk.” Kuroo says as he toes off his shoes. Hinata watches him walk over to Kenma, who is sitting at their tiny, circular dining table, fiddling with his phone. He kisses the top of his head and cranes his neck to look at what Hinata’s working on in the kitchen. “Udon?” 

“Yeah, from down the street.” Hinata carefully places three steaming bowls in his arms, setting them down the table and plopping down the chair. “Sit, sit. I’m starving.” 

They dig into their meal in comfortable silence. Hinata relishes the steaming broth, and how it manages to make him feel at ease, every single time, no matter how big his problems are. Even if he’s been filled with dread and shame all day. Even if he ruined a lovely evening, with a lovely boy, who probably never wants to see him again... 

His train of thought breaks off when Kuroo asks him a question. “Where were you last night? We wanted to watch more of _Chernobyl_.” 

“Did you watch it without me?!” Hinata accuses, eyes narrow and mouth full. No matter how foggy and how sad he may feel, things at home always felt normal. He’s grateful for that. 

“No we didn’t, thanks to _someone_ ditching out on TV night. I just watched Kenma play Animal Crossing until I passed out.” 

“Oh. Good.” Hinata focuses on his noodles, which he knows gives him about two seconds of stalling time until— 

“So where were you?” Kuroo tries again. 

He looks up at Kuroo, then at Kenma, who just stares back at him. Hinata doesn’t blame him. He had spent all afternoon venting to him while Kuroo was at practice, reliving the date over and over, indulging in his embarrassment and agony with Kenma listening to every word. He wasn’t gonna help him out of this, nor should he. He was gonna have to tell Kuroo sooner or later that he embarrassed himself in front of the adorable boy on the volleyball team. _Kuroo’s_ volleyball team. Ugh. “I was on a date.” 

Kuroo raises an eyebrow, flicks his eyes at Kenma for a split second, then looks back at Hinata. He opens his mouth and starts to say something when Hinata’s phone starts ringing from the kitchen. 

“Sorry!” Hinata jumps up and goes to decline the call, but his finger freezes midair when he sees the caller ID. 

_Kageyama Tobio._

* 

The moon is out and it’s starting to properly get cold, but Kageyama stays rooted to where he is on the sidewalk. His sweaty palm is holding his phone to his ear, listening to the line ring once, twice... 

He’s gonna do this before he changes his mind. In public, with a random guy smoking a joint in the corner of the street. 

Thrice...four times... 

“Hello?” 

* 

Hinata ignores Kuroo and Kenma’s stares, nestles his phone between his ear and neck, and pulls their balcony entrance open. Well, ‘balcony’ is a generous term. It’s more of a glorified fire escape, without the escape. He can barely hear Kageyama’s reply over his thudding chest. “Hi, Hinata.” 

“Hey. I’m glad you called.” He leans forward and inhales a shaky breath. 

“Is this a good time?” 

“No, yeah, it is. Listen, I’m so sorry about last night.” 

“It’s okay.” A pause. “Did you get your paper done in time?” 

Hinata lets his head hang forward. Surely, they both have to know what a terrible liar he is, but Kageyama is giving him a chance. He owes him that same decency. “That wasn’t the reason I left.” 

“No?” 

“No. I lied. I’m sorry.” 

“You’re a bad liar.” 

That pulls a laugh out of Hinata’s chest, high and loud. 

* 

He loves Hinata’s laugh. Clear, genuine, and _full_. He feels the air around him change and open up. It’s almost like he’s hearing it in real life... 

Kageyama turns around. He looks up, looks left, and spots a tiny orange head leaning out one of the windows. 

“I know I am.” He hears Hinata reply. Kageyama can see the orange head hang low, with a hand running through it. Hinata speaks again. “I can explain. If you want.” 

“I do. Um,” Kageyema has taken a few steps toward that window, about three stories up, and is unabashedly staring at this orange head. From where he is now, he can see that the head, still ducked low, is connected to a slim body, wearing a white shirt and olive jeans and— 

“Can you look up?” 

* 

“Can I look up?” Hinata repeats. He instinctively lifts his head to scan the area, suddenly hyper aware of the night air around him, and— 

There he is: Kageyama Tobio, in his athletic jacket, joggers and running shoes. An outfit too flimsy for the cold, standing on the sidewalk in front of his apartment. 

* 

Turns out, Hinata’s eyes can get even bigger. He wonders if he’ll run out of things to admire when he looks at him. “Hi.” 

“Hi.” He can now see Hinata’s mouth moving along to words he hears on the phone. Neither of them make a move to hang up. “How did you know where I live?” 

“I didn’t know you live here.” Kageyama suddenly realizes that he has to explain how he somehow ended up at his house, and why he _isn’t_ a straight-up stalker. “I just...I think you live in the same building as my teammate.” 

Hinata’s eyes get big again. He watches him look back into his apartment, then back at him. “Wait. Are you talking about Kuroo?” 

“Yes.” Now it was Kageyama’s turn to be confused. Not that he wasn’t confused before. All of this is confusing. “I’m confused.” 

“Yeah, sorry, It’s just. Um.” He watches Hinata look back again, then back at him. “I’ll be right down, okay? I can explain everything.” 

“Okay,” Kageyama replies, but Hinata is already pulling open his window and contorting his body back inside. He hears the call end. 

* 

“I’ll be right back.” Hinata announces, slipping his phone into his pocket and pulling on his jacket. He looks at his friends, with Kuroo looking at him quizzically and Kenma eating his soup. “I’ll explain later.” He shoves his feet into his shoes and puts his hand on the door, but turns back around and grabs his own bowl from the table. Without saying anything else, he opens the door and hurries down the stairs, careful not to spill the broth over the sides. 

He really is starving. 

* 

Hinata comes out of the building in that maroon jacket and a bowl. “Hey,” he smiles as he closes the door behind him. “There’s a bench just past the corner, let’s go there.” 

“Sure.” 

They walk in silence for a beat before Hinata speaks again. “I’m sorry, we were just having dinner and I didn’t want Kuroo to eat my bowl while I was gone.” 

Kageyama stops walking. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to interru—” 

“No, no. I still have my udon, don’t I?” He smiles again. “So we’re good.” 

They reach the bench and sit. The sidewalk is lined with street lamps, and Kageyama tries to ignore the slight numbness he’s getting from the cold. He watches Hinata tip the bowl into his mouth, slurping the broth, and humming in satisfaction. He wipes the corner of his mouth with his sleeve, and offers the bowl to Kageyama. “Please have some. You must be cold.” He then slips his free hand into his pocket, and produces a pair of disposable chopsticks. 

Kageyama stares at the bowl, at the thick noodles, beef swimming in the middle, with an egg swirling at the side. He looks back at him. “Are you sure?” 

“Absolutely. Besides,” Hinata says when he hands it over, “I have some talking to do.” 

Kageyama sips the broth, feels his insides contract happily, and listens. 

“I used to love volleyball,” Hinata begins. He looks up at the sky as he talks, but Kageyama keeps looking at him. “It was my whole life. I loved watching it, and wanted so badly to play like they did on TV. I started a team at my middle school, and I was the only member until third year. I completely sucked. I couldn’t receive, I couldn’t pass. But I could jump. And I was desperate. I wanted to be good so badly. By some stroke of luck, we made it to a tournament, and got wrecked in two sets. I was heartbroken. But I think that was when I was the happiest. 

Kageyama immediately thinks back to his middle school tournament. Playing for Shiratorizawa for three years didn’t give him much chance to play a lot of other teams; it was usually the same three. He couldn’t picture Hinata in those memories. He would have remembered him. 

Hinata continues. “I ended up at Karasuno after that. It was my dream school, and I had really great senpais. They were willing to train me, whip me into shape, and they were just as ambitious as I was. We all kept talking about going to Nationals and going to Tokyo. Make it all the way to the top.” He takes a breath and keeps going. “I had a really good time that first year. I learned a lot. Got my ass handed to me. It’s where I met Kuroo and Kenma, actually. We had a practice match, and they were so good, and I was desperate to learn. So, incredibly desperate. But nothing really came of it. I grew taller, but not enough. I got a little better, but it came up short.” He takes a deep breath. “I never became a starting member of Karasuno.” 

Kageyama didn’t make it to the starting lineup in his first year of high school, and he remembers how badly he wanted to play. Who knows what would have happened if their star setter wasn’t already in his third year. Would he have been good enough to beat him? He looks at Hinata, cheeks reddening from the cold, and he feels torn over what he wants to do more: let him keep talking, or to touch his face. 

He ignores that thought and listens to Hinata speak. “In my third year, I eventually accepted that I was never gonna play volleyball. Not the way I wanted to play it. I thought I did everything right. Instead, I studied. I hung out with Kenma more, and we eventually became inseparable. I read, and wrote, and got into university. But I’m still heartbroken. I’m not sure if I’ll ever stop being sad about it. To this day, I still can’t come to Kuroo’s games. It’s all just a slap in the face, a reminder of what I failed to do. And I know it might be difficult to understand, but it was like my whole life was a lie. For so long, I just felt it in my bones: I was gonna play. I was gonna be good. And then I didn't. I wasn’t. I was wrong.” 

Hinata looks down into his lap. “That’s why I ran last night. I wasn’t ready to deal with that fact, even though I forced it out of you. I do that a lot. I was wrong there too, and I’m sorry. You’re probably a really good player.” He laughs to himself at that, and takes another steadying breath. “But that’s it. That’s my sad, underwhelming explanation. I’m sorry again, I really did have a great time last night.”  


* 

Kageyama is quiet for a long time after Hinata stopped talking. In the silence, Hinata takes the bowl from the middle of the bench, where Kageyama had placed it, and inhales the rest of the udon. When he sets it back down, Kageyama mutters, “I wanted to go to Karasuno, too.” 

“You did? But you didn’t.” 

“I didn’t.” He looks up at the sky. The sky was clear, and stars were glittering around the half moon. “I got into Inarizaki and moved to Tokyo.” 

Hinata mimics him, craning his neck up high. “That’s a good school.” 

“Yeah.” He feels Kageyama looking at him, but Hinata doesn’t move. He just listens to him talk. “I still owe you one.” 

“What?” 

“A secret. We agreed we’d trade last night, and I haven’t given you one yet. I have to tell you one now.” Hinata watches him pick up the empty bowl and carefully place it behind him on the ground. 

“And what’s that?” Hinata keeps his eyes on the empty spot between them. In this heightened state of vulnerability, he’s afraid of what will happen to him if they make eye contact. Would he cry? Would he keep talking? Run away again? 

He feels a finger gently coax his chin up, interrupting his train of thought. He gives in, looking up to see Kageyama’s face. His gorgeous, smiling face, with eyes so blue and intense that it puts the sparkling night sky to shame. His gorgeous, smiling mouth breaks into a smaller, yet softer smile when he whispers, “I’d like to kiss you. Is that okay?” 

Without thinking, Hinata feels his head bob in agreement. From it’s light touch on his chin, Kageyama’s index finger shifts to let his entire hand cup his cheek, moving back towards his neck, and up towards his hair. Hinata feels his eyes flutter shut as he feels that hand pull him forward until their lips meet. Gently. 

God, everything about him is so gentle. 

They move together easily. Hinata feels their tempo thrumming along his veins, all the way to the tips of his fingers, the balls of his feet, the goosebumps along his skin. Like they were supposed to be kissing for a long, long time. 

When they pull apart, Hianta can feel the grin splitting through his face. He looks at Kageyama, slightly pink and eyes wide, and laughs to himself. 

“What?” Kageyama narrows his eyes. 

“Nothing. I’m happy.” For good measure, Hianta leans forward, grabs Kageyama’s face with two hands, and kisses him again. When they pull apart again, Hinata cocks his head. “You’re good.” 

Kageyama gets pinker. “Thanks. So are you.” 

Hinata grins again. “Thanks!” 

“Listen, you should probably get back to your apartment.” 

“Probably. When can I see you again?” 

“Whenever you want.” Kageyama replies without a hint of irony, and Hinata can’t help but smile again. 

“I’ll text you, then?” 

“Yes. Text me.” 

“Okay.” Hinata doesn’t move. He just keeps looking at him. Kageyama gets up and picks up the bowl, and offers a hand out to him. Hinata takes it, and doesn’t let it go when they start to walk back towards his building. 

He’s enjoying this walk, relishing in his buzzing ears and wishing they had gone to a further away location, when Kageyama says, “So Kuroo-san is your roommate.” 

“Yeah. Is that weird?” 

“No. Should it be weird?” Kageyama’s brows furrow.

They’ve reached the front entrance. “No! No. You should come over sometime. You can meet Kenma, too.” 

Kageyama smiles again. Hinata makes it his personal mission to make it happen as much as possible. “Yeah, I’d like that.” He leans in, kisses his cheek, and lets go of his hand. “Goodnight, Hinata.” 

“Goodnight.” Hinata turns around, opens the door, and enters the building. He likes to think Kageyama was watching him the whole time. 

* 

He watches him until he disappears behind the stairwell. He turns and walks towards his dorm, head spinning. His whole body is tingling. The cold air suddenly feels refreshing. 

He’s happy. This is happy. 

Halfway to his place, he realizes he’s still holding Hinata’s bowl. It’s okay; he can just give it back to him when he sees him again. 

Because this is something he can do now. 

He’s going to see Hinata Shouyou again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> whelp, this was the big one, fellas! i hope you liked it, and please let me know what you think in the comments, if you'd like. again, thanks so much for reading, and I'll see you on thursday <3


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hi friends! thanks so much for the nice response to chapter 5. i hope you enjoy this one! xx 
> 
> also, as a general note, I am not reading the manga (yet), and so all these post canon musings are purely from my brain.

We two boys together clinging,  
One the other never leaving,  
Up and down the roads going, North and South excursions making,  
Power enjoying, elbows stretching, fingers clutching  
Arm’d and fearless, eating, drinking, sleeping, loving...  
Cities wrenching, ease scorning, statues mocking, feebleness chasing,  
Fulfilling our foray. 

-Walt Whitman, “We Two Boys Together Clinging”

-  
_> >I was thinking_

_> >Bad idea._

__> >Shut up. I was thinking....do you want to have dinner with Kuroo and Kenma tonight?_ _

__> >Just me and them?_ _

__> >What? No, I’ll be there too, dummy_ _

__> >Oh. Then yes._ _

__> >Great!_ _

__> >Are you still coming to mine after class?>>_ _

___> >If you want_ _ _

___> >I want._ _ _

__

__It’s been good. _So good_. _ _

__Because he is with Hinata. And they are together. Because Hinata would wait for him outside the West building after his lectures, sitting on the railing while waiting for him to come out. Because Kageyama would walk to his apartment early in the morning, just so they could walk to the cafe together to study. Because seeing his face look up, emerge from the door, or look over at him in conversation causes his insides to boil, steaming up the rest of his body and making Kageyama feel renewed. Because they would hold hands when they walk. Because they would kiss outside Hinata’s building, and Hinata would bite his cheek, and Kageyama would play with his hair._ _

__He doesn’t know if he’ll get over the rolling realization, relentless and forceful, that he’s happy. So happy._ _

__

__“By the way,” Hinata murmurs. Kageyama doesn’t know how long they’d been here, in his apartment. Hours, days, for all he cares. (He doesn’t.)_ _

__With Hinata in his room—gorgeous, soft Hinata—the walls are suddenly radiating light. The window is somehow bigger. The last of the afternoon light is streaming down his skin, hitting Hinata’s exposed collarbone. Kageyama brushes his lips against that spot. He can do this now, and he doesn’t like to waste chances._ _

__“Tobio,” Hinata chides._ _

__“Hm?” He’s only half-listening. He continues down the line, settling on the hollow of Hinata’s throat._ _

__“You’re not listening.” He feels the vibrations of his throat._ _

__“I am.” Kageyama moves back up to his ear, whispering against the shell. “Keep talking.”_ _

__He feels Hinata sigh deeply against him. “This is important. It’s kind of...I have to confess something.”_ _

__Reluctantly, Kageyama pulls back, just enough to raise an eyebrow at him._ _

__Hinata keeps his eyes on their interlocked fingers. “You know _Native Speaker?_ ”_ _

__Kageyama feels his brow arch higher. His eyes flit to his desk, where the book has been lying untouched since—well, since they met. “Yes. Why?”_ _

__Hinata takes another deep breath and looks at him directly. “It’s my book.”_ _

__“That’s your book?”_ _

__Hinata nods. “From the shelf at Renaissance.” His gaze falls back down. “I saw you pick up a book the first time you did. On Earth. Then The Sympathizer. Then Native Speaker. I’ve kind of...had my eye on you all this time.”_ _

__“Oh.” Kageyama says. He rolls over and flops back down next to him, raising his arm to not crush Hinata’s shoulder. As if on cue, Hinata tucks underneath, resting his head on Kageyama’s chest. He wraps his arm around his shoulder, tracing his finger down to Hinata’s elbow, then back up._ _

__*_ _

__“So you noticed me? That first day?”_ _

__Hinata snorts. “Yes.” He doesn’t say anything more._ _

__A pause. “What did you notice about me?”_ _

__Hinata sneers when he looks back at him. Kageyama is keeping his eyes fixed on the ceiling. That’s fine; Hinata keeps studying his profile. Because he can do that now. He’s realizing, bit by glorious bit, how much he’s allowed to do now. Like tell him the truth. “You were tall.”_ _

__“I was tall.” Kageyama repeats. “That’s it?”_ _

__“Pretty much.”_ _

__Another pause. He can _hear_ Kageyama’s brain whirring, and he bites his lip to hide a smile. Kageyama’s eyes side over to look at him. “Is that really it?” _ _

__Hinata laughs. This stupid, gorgeous boy. “Well, let me think,” he teases. He rolls over and hooks his chin on Kageyama’s shoulder. “I liked your hair. And your eyes, and how you were nice to Sugawara-san when you ordered your coffee.” Hinata closes his eyes, inhaling Kageyama’s scent. Soap, and clean sheets, and warm. He feels like a mushy pile of contentment, where his brain and mouth and heart and lungs are all swirling around as one. “And you asked about the books.”_ _

__*_ _

__Kageyama wonders if he should bring those books to his next shrine visit. Or switch majors. Or read every book on that deteriorating shelf, if it keeps bringing him the kind of thing he got the first time around._ _

__He thinks about the box shoved at the corner of his room, and quickly pushes the thought away._ _

__He turns to look at Hinata. Watching him beneath the sunset light is making his throat dry. “I asked about some books. And you...liked that?”_ _

__“Yes, but here’s the kicker.” Hinata smiles, and Kageyama feels like he can walk on air. “You chose all of mine.”_ _

__*_ _

__Hinata is thrilled to learn that Kageyama isn't always a gentle kisser. If he pushes him _just so _, he falls apart under Hinata’s hands.___ _

____So Hinata pushes him. And Kageyama seems to like it._ _ _ _

____*_ _ _ _

____He hasn’t been held like this since…_ _ _ _

____Since…_ _ _ _

____He kisses Hinata deeply. He wants to give everything here, at this moment, so that he can forget._ _ _ _

____So he can be cleansed._ _ _ _

____He doesn’t look at Hinata. Not now; he can’t bear it. He wants to listen to his heartbeat, so closely that it can replace his. So he can get a shiny, new heart, unbroken and fully operational. Like Hinata’s._ _ _ _

____He doesn’t look at him, so Hinata’s question catches him by surprise. “Hey,” he feels a poke on his cheek. “What are you thinking about?”_ _ _ _

____*_ _ _ _

____He’s so close, so warm. But he’s a million miles away._ _ _ _

____*_ _ _ _

____“Nothing.” He keeps his head down._ _ _ _

____There was a long pause. He feels small fingers comb through his hair, scratching gently at his scalp. “Alright,” Hinata replies. He looks up, and sure enough, he’s smiling._ _ _ _

____Kageyama prays that’s the last of it. He’ll be damned if he lets that—it, _him_ —ruin another thing in his life. _ _ _ _

____*_ _ _ _

____Later that night, when the sun is fully set, they walk to Hinata’s building. Kageyama is nervous. Hinata can feel it. It’s understandable, given that they’re about to have dinner at his apartment with his two best friends. “Are you nervous?”_ _ _ _

____“No.”_ _ _ _

____“Tobio,” Hinata prompts. He can see a small from start to form._ _ _ _

____Kageyama avoids his gaze. “Kuroo-san is my captain.”_ _ _ _

____“Hey, none of that!” Hinata forms his arms in a giant ‘X’. “Tonight, he’s just my stupid friend who I love very much. Got it?”_ _ _ _

____Kageyama purses his lips. “Are you ever afraid of him?”_ _ _ _

____Hinata sputters a laugh. He indulges in taking Kageyama’s hand as they walk, squeezing and swinging it in the air. “No. Well, in the beginning, yeah. But there’s nothing to be afraid of. Okay?”_ _ _ _

____Kageyama takes a breath. “Okay.”_ _ _ _

____*_ _ _ _

____“Also,” Hinata continues. Kageyama looks at him expectantly, but Hinata keeps his gaze on the sidewalk. “I’d really appreciate it if you and Kuroo don’t talk about volleyball. If that’s alright.”_ _ _ _

____Hinata can punch him in the face and steal his wallet, and it would be alright. He takes Hinata’s hand and kisses it._ _ _ _

____ _ _

____They walk up the four flights of stairs to Hinata’s—and Kuroo’s—apartment. Kageyama feels his heart rate pick up, and he pretends it’s from the cardio. Nevermind that he’s a literal athlete._ _ _ _

____When they reach a door at the end of the hallway, Hinata fumbles with his keys. He pauses when it slides in the lock. “Um. I should probably tell you. I told Kenma everything about you.”_ _ _ _

____“What does ‘everything’ mean?”_ _ _ _

____Hinata bites his lip, and Kageyama wonders if this is a terrible time to kiss him. “You’ll see.” Without another warning, he turns the key and swings open the door. “We’re here!” He calls inside. Kageyama was going to give himself an extra second to linger in the doorway, taking another breath and settling his nerves, but he suddenly feels Hinata’s hand find his, and he immediately gets pulled into the apartment. And he lets him._ _ _ _

____The first thing he notices about their apartment is the temperature; it was _warm_. He never bothered turning on the heat in his own dorm, even if it was late November. He never minded the cold, and it’s not like there was anyone else to worry about. _ _ _ _

____The second thing is the _books_. There’s a standard-sized bookshelf standing against the wall stuffed to the brim, but he sees stacks of books on the coffee table, and a bunch of tall piles along the floor. He makes a note to browse through them later, if he gets the chance. _ _ _ _

____The third, of course, is Kuroo. Crouching slightly as he sets the table, Kageyama notices he’s a small jump away from bumping his head from the ceiling. He looks up when they enter. “Well, well, well,” he gives him an amused grin, stretching wide across his face. “If it isn’t the lover boy.”_ _ _ _

____Kageyama bows in greeting, partly to hide the blush across his cheeks. “Good evening, Kuroo-san.”_ _ _ _

____“Fuck that, my man,” he reaches over and slaps him on the back. “Forget about team stuff tonight, yeah? I won’t tell everyone else I made you dinner.” He winks, and Kageyama feels himself relax. “Besides, it's not a good look to bow for your boyfriends’ friend.”_ _ _ _

____“Stop it, Kuroo,” he hears a cool voice behind him. He turns and sees another man, barely taller than Hinata, emerging from the kitchen with a steaming bowl. He sets it aside and gives Kageyama a small smile. “I’d tell you he’s just being a dick, but you already know that.”_ _ _ _

____That makes Kageyama chuckle. The man has long, purple hair tied in a loose ponytail. It’s hanging several inches below his nape. He’s wearing a white t-shirt with the hem tied in a knot, showing a small sliver of his abdomen. Ripped black jeans clad his slim legs. Something about him rings a bell. “Have we met before?”_ _ _ _

____“Not officially,” he answers. “I watch the team practices pretty often. I’m Kozume Kenma.” He holds out his hand, and Kageyama takes it._ _ _ _

____“My partner,” Kuroo explains in a crooked smile. “Have a seat. We made udon.”_ _ _ _

____“Of course,” Kageyama smiles. He takes the nearest chair, and Hinata settles beside him. “I’ve heard a lot about you, Kozume-san.”_ _ _ _

____Kenma wrinkles his nose in apparent disgust as he reaches for Kageyama’s bowl. He’s ladling broth into the bowl when he replies. “Please, just Kenma. None of that honorific shit in this house.”_ _ _ _

____“Oh.” Kageyama squashes down the temptation to feel embarrassed. He decides to give himself a do-over. “I’ve heard a lot about you, Kenma.”_ _ _ _

____This time, Kenma’s smile is more coy. “And _I_ have seen you play a lot.” He finishes ladling the third bowl, and he finally moves on to his own. “You’re excellent.” _ _ _ _

____“Kenma played setter in high school,” Kuroo chimes in._ _ _ _

____“Were you good?”_ _ _ _

____Kuroo, Kenma, and Hinata all reply at the same time. “Yes.”_ _ _ _

____Hinata laughs. “What a narcissist. You’re supposed to let Kuroo and I answer that.”_ _ _ _

____Kenma doesn’t reply and busies himself with his noodles, prompting Kageyama to ask, “Why didn’t you keep playing after high school?”_ _ _ _

____He takes his time to answer, carefully swallowing his food. “I didn’t even play in third year.”_ _ _ _

____“He was pretty much only in it for Kuroo,” Hinata answers with his mouth full. Kageyama would normally recoil at something like that, but instead he finds it endearing. Because of course he does._ _ _ _

____“Not true,” Kuroo counters. “After some time, you started to like the other idiots on that team. Nekomata-sensei and I both saw it.”_ _ _ _

____Barely twenty minutes into their meal, Kageyama immediately notices that Kuroo is different. Here at his home, it’s to be expected. And the core of him, of course, is still there. But in practice, all the parts of him that are loud are now simmered down to a gentle rumble in his voice. In practice, his eyes were laser-focused, all-seeing and almost cold. Now, they’re hazy and warm._ _ _ _

____So that’s what being in love looks like._ _ _ _

____Kageyama refocuses on the conversation. “Nekomata?” he asks. “You two played for Nekoma?”_ _ _ _

____He feels Hinata stare at him. Kuroo’s eyes sparkle. “Impressive.”_ _ _ _

____Kageyama feels his face get warm from the compliment, but he ignores it. He does some rough math based on Kuroo and Kenma’s ages, and he starts to remember everything he’s heard about that team. “Your team was really good. The receiving foundation was the best in the country, and it all centred on...” He feels his voice drop when he realizes._ _ _ _

____“Don’t say it,” Kenma looks genuinely pained._ _ _ _

____“Do us the honour, good sir,” Kuroo sneers._ _ _ _

____“It all centred on the brilliant setter,” he finishes. Kageyama is stunned. He’s heard so much about this team. So much chatter and legend, and yet it was another one that he never got the chance to play in high school. “I watched your games.”_ _ _ _

____Kenma’s face softens. “Clearly, you were doing just fine on your own, Tobio. I’ve never seen anyone set like you do. Frankly, you terrify me.”_ _ _ _

____“He means that as a compliment,” Kuroo winks._ _ _ _

____“He actually does,” Hinata adds. Kageyama sees his eyes light up when he continues, “Kuroo, did you know Kageyama went to Inarizaki?”_ _ _ _

____Kuroo’s eyes widen. “No shit,” he says. “You guys were monsters. Does that mean—”_ _ _ _

_____Oh no. God, no._ _ _ _ _

____“—you played with Miya Atsumu?”_ _ _ _

____Kageyama feels his insides turn to ice. He was so lulled by the warmth, by the joy of having dinner with Hinata and his friends, that he forgot to keep the conversation at a tight hold. He feels his heartbeat start to pick up. His brain is frantically searching for a way to pivot the conversation. One second has passed, and he only has about another two before someone notices. _One Mississippi, two Mississippi_ — _ _ _ _

____“I did. He was captain when I was in second year.” He thinks he managed to keep his voice even and indifferent. His hands, itching to do something, starts stacking the bowls and dishes in front of him. “We didn’t really talk much. But he was a great player.” He feels daggers in the air from the opposite side of the table, and when he looks up, Kenma’s eyes are wide open and staring at him. His gold irises are intent and unrelenting, and it makes Kageyama sweat._ _ _ _

____“Are we down for dessert?” Kuroo asks, and Kageyama exhales in relief. “We have mochi from across town.”_ _ _ _

____Kenma gets up to get them from the kitchen, but Kageyama won’t forget the weight of his stare._ _ _ _

____He feels something knock against his foot underneath the table. When he looks over at Hinata, smiling a smile that he can look at for hours, he feels himself relax. He shoves a mochi ball in his mouth._ _ _ _

____*_ _ _ _

____Kageyama is having a good time. Or at least Hinata thinks he is. “How did you two meet?” he asks Kenma and Kuroo. “Was it in high school?”_ _ _ _

____“Ooh, let me tell this story.” Hinata swallows another piece of mochi, slaps his hands on the table, and balls his fists in excitement._ _ _ _

____Kuroo rolls his eyes, but he’s smiling. “Go ahead, Person I’m Not Dating.”_ _ _ _

____Hinata ignores him and starts talking with his hands. “In a quiet Tokyo street full of rowdy children, nine-year-old Kuroo and eight-year-old Kenma became unlikely friends. Kuroo would barge into Kenma’s house and force him to play outside and play volleyball, eventually getting him to join the elementary school team. In their first year of high school, they realize they’re in love.” Hinata sighs and wistfully looks up to the ceiling. “And the rest is history.”_ _ _ _

____“Booooooo,” Kuroo heckles. “You make me sound like I forced Kenma to be my friend.” He flings his chopstick towards Hinata. Kageyama watches it catapult into the air, flying squarely towards Hinata’s face. Without thinking, he catches it with his right hand._ _ _ _

____“You can’t deny the facts, Kuroo.”_ _ _ _

____ _ _

____The whole dinner was a success, and Hinata couldn’t be more proud. The rest of the night was pleasant and fun and _easy_. Watching Kageyama settle into their apartment, settle into his _friends_ makes him feel stupid with joy. _ _ _ _

____When Kageyama leaves, Hinata wants to plant a sloppy kiss on his mouth. He doesn’t, because he has a _little_ bit of dignity, but when he waves one last time and shuts the door, Hinata lets his grin stretch wide across his face. _ _ _ _

____He can’t help but hum as him and Kenma clear the table. He’s full of udon and ice cream, and he can’t believe the thrill running in his veins. Kageyama was just over for dinner with his two best friends. He hovers playfully over Kenma. “So what did you think?”_ _ _ _

____“Of Kageyama?”_ _ _ _

____“Duh.”_ _ _ _

____“I feel like you would pout at anything I’d say.” He looks up at him. “You clearly like him a lot.”_ _ _ _

____Hinata feels his face immediately contort into a frown. He opens his mouth to counter, but Kenma cuts him off with a hand. “You clearly like him a lot,” he repeats, “But that boy outright _adores_ you.” _ _ _ _

____Hinata’s jaw drops, and his heart flutters. “I mean, I wouldn’t say he _adores_ me—” _ _ _ _

____“He does.”_ _ _ _

____“We can’t know that for sure—”_ _ _ _

____“He does!” Kuroo yells from the kitchen. He has no idea how he can eavesdrop over the running water and clanking dishes._ _ _ _

____Stunned, Hinata pauses. He can’t remember anything Kageyama actually _did_. They ate and talked; things normal people do. And even though Hinata has never been a normal person, he feels like it when he’s looking into his blue eyes. He’s never been a normal person, but he can pretend. _ _ _ _

____Someone adores him. _Kageyama_ adores him. He lets that thought settle in his brain, rolling it over like soft dough. _ _ _ _

____“Shouyou,” Kenma says. Hinata snaps his attention back at his wide eyes, carefully studying his face. “Did you notice him react...weirdly to something tonight?”_ _ _ _

____Hinata slumps down on one of the chairs. _His_ chair. “No?” He answers thoughtfully. “What did he do?” _ _ _ _

____“You didn’t notice anything weird when we were talking about Inarizaki?”_ _ _ _

____“We both know this would go faster if you just tell me what you’re thinking,” Hianta throws him a half-annoyed look._ _ _ _

____Kenma takes a seat. “When Kuroo asked him about that captain, Miya something—”_ _ _ _

____“Miya Atsumu,” Kuroo offers. He emerges from the kitchen, wiping his hands with a dish towel, and leans against the door frame. He looks at Kenma and nods._ _ _ _

____Kenma nods back, silently confirming something only the two of them can see. “When Kuroo asked if he knew him, it’s almost like he was caught off guard.”_ _ _ _

____“What? No he didn’t,” Hinata frowns. “He just said he was a good captain or something, right?”_ _ _ _

____Kenma nods and bites his lip. “There was something off about him just then. Kuroo and I both felt it.”_ _ _ _

____Hinata looks over at him, and Kuroo shrugs. “It could just be nothing. But Miya...let’s just say I’ve heard some things about him over the years.”_ _ _ _

____“Wait, what do you mean?” Hinata demands. “What kind of things?”_ _ _ _

____Kuroo purses his lips and twists the dish towel with his hands. “I think this is something you should ask Kageyama instead of me. It’s all just gossip. I don’t want to cause anything.”_ _ _ _

____Hinata frowns at both of them. He’s at a genuine loss. A minute ago, the whole night played out like a Renaissance painting in his head. Just without death or babies. “Do you two think he’s keeping something from me?”_ _ _ _

____“Absolutely not,” Kenma says. “But it can’t hurt to ask him. It could be nothing, or it could be something that Kageyama desperately hopes is nothing. And he’s papering it over, but it doesn’t disappear, no matter how hard he tries.” He gives Hinata a pointed look. “Doesn’t that remind you of anyone?”_ _ _ _

____Hinata slumps all the way down, mulling it over. He thinks of Kageyama’s small smile, bright skin, and neat hair._ _ _ _

____And he hopes to every god he knows that he doesn’t share any of Hinata’s pain, any of his coping mechanisms. His own baggage is more than enough._ _ _ _


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hi friends! hope you're well. please note an added character tag (if you don't care about spoilers, that is.) 
> 
> enjoy! x

But down the darling well one only rose  
In all the year is shed;  
And o’er that chill and secret wave it throws  
A sudden dawn of red.

\- A. Mary F. Robinson, “Rosa Rosarum”

— 

_> >We’re going to a Christmas festival downtown tonight_

_> >It’s December 3rd_

_> >....?? And your point?_

_> >It’s way too early to do anything Christmassy_

_> >WRONG. How embarrassing for you_

_> >I guess this isn’t something we can agree to disagree on?_

_> >No. You’re an idiot._

Kageyama shouldn’t get butterflies from _being called an idiot_ , but dating Hianta has been an exercise to see how much lower he can go. Apparently, rock bottom keeps getting deeper and deeper. And he will happily keep digging.

He can’t help but smile like a moron when he types out his reply. 

_> >I’ll pick you up at 5. Bring a thicker jacket this time._

* 

Hinata is rushing around the apartment, stuffing books in his backpack and wrapping his scarf around his neck, while Kenma sits on the couch with his book. _The Caliban and the Witch_ by Sylvia Frederici. “Have you seen my keys?” Hinata asks. 

“On top of the microwave,” he replies without looking up. 

“My hero,” Hinata mutters as he swipes them up and slips the lanyard into his pocket. He has one hand on the doorknob when he says, “I’m gonna go. You and Kuroo will meet us tonight?” 

Kenma nods. “Have you asked him about that thing we talked about?” 

Hinata sighs. “No.” 

“Okay.” The most annoying thing about this reply, Hinata thinks, is that Kenma means it. Even so, he can feel himself getting defensive. 

“You’re judging me.” 

“I’m not.” 

“I’m not saying I don’t believe you about that stuff. It’s just...things have been really good, and I _feel_ really good, you know? I just don’t want to...” he lets himself trail off, staring at the door. 

“I know. I was just asking, Shouyou, I promise. Now go. You’re late for class.” Hinata hesitates, biting his lip as he tries to study Kenma’s expression. His eyes soften. “We’ll see you tonight.” 

Hinata smiles. “Yeah, okay.” 

As he exits their building and braces the December wind, his hand itches towards his phone in his jacket pocket. But after a second, he balls it into a fist and drops the idea. How would he even bring it up? _Hey, Tobio. Remember when you mentioned two weeks ago that you had a captain in high school? Do you happen to have baggage surrounding this particular individual?_ He wrinkles his nose at the thought, squashes it down into the deep creases in his brain, and stares straight ahead towards Early Modern Lit. 

* 

Kageyama is pulling on his sweater—deep green, cashmere, his fanciest piece of clothing—when he hears his phone ping on his desk. 

_> >Did you know we don’t have any pictures together?_

Kageyama is typing out a reply when Hinata sends another text. 

_> >Please don’t be those people who hates taking pictures with people_

His eyes automatically flit to the box at the corner of the room. He stares at the dust gathering at the lid. 

_”Just one picture, Tobio-kun!”_ The voice, chipper and unwelcome, slithers in his brain. He takes a deep breath and grits his teeth, shutting it out. 

He picks up his phone to type out a response, but his brain is not cooperating. He shuts his eyes and tries, pretty desperately, to tune it out. 

His eyes open when a third ping chimes from his phone. 

_> >Anyway, I’m bringing my polaroid. NO COMPLAINTS._

He pockets his phone and shuts the door behind him, trying to breathe a little better. 

* 

Stepping out of the station and into the downtown streets, Hinata can’t help but shiver. Despite Kageyama’s text, he decided to stick with his burgundy jacket, even though it’s probably past its usefulness now that they’re hitting temperatures below ten. 

He feels something touch his shoulder. He turns and sees Kageyama, with his coat already shrugged off, sitting on his outstretched arm as an offer. With that outer layer removed, Hianta notices he’s wearing a sweater he’s never seen on him before. It’s forest green, soft-looking, and lovely. It brings out the blue in his eyes. That bastard. 

When he doesn’t take the jacket, Kageyama rolls his eyes and drops it on top of his head. “You’re gonna get a fever.” 

“No I won’t,” Hinata mutters as he puts it on. The sleeves hang past his arms, and the hem is touching the top of his thighs. He can smell his soap and a hit of cologne on it, and his chest constricts happily. Is it possible for someone to hear your feelings? “Thank you,” he grumbles. 

He’s so focused on his own thudding chest to realize that Kageyama has stepped forward, leaned down, and cupped his cheek with his right hand. It’s all Hinata can do not to choke on his own spit when their lips meet. And now they’re just there, kissing on the sidewalk, ten feet from the ticket booth. 

“You look good in my coat,” Kageyama says when they pull away. 

“Tacky line, Tobio,” Hinata teases. He has to walk slightly ahead to pull himself together, but their hands stay laced. The sight of twinkling lights, rows of rustic cabins, and Christmas music blaring in the speakers is enough to make him smile to himself. He will have fun tonight. No worrying about random past teammates, or secrets, or scary conversations— 

He feels Kageyama tug on his hand. “What are you thinking?” 

Hinata looks up at him and tries to smile. “I want food.” Well, that’s definitely not a lie. 

Kageyama chuckles, as he’d hoped, but then he drops his hand, swings it over their heads, and wraps it around Hinata’s shoulder. They keep walking as if it was the most natural thing in the world, not missing a beat. Like they do this all the time. 

Because the joy coursing through him is borderline delirium, Hinata doesn’t dare wonder what’s gotten into him. 

* 

Kageyama wonders if he’s drunk. Or on steroids. Or if Hinata himself is just a human embodiment of a performance-enhancing drug. 

Pills, needle injection, invasive surgery—he will take every dose, through every way. 

*

They’re lining up for the pork hock booth (“Don’t they have normal food here?” “There’s no such thing as abnormal food, dummy”) when Hinata hears a voice call out from behind them. “‘Sup, homos?” He turns to see Kuroo walk up to them with Kenma by his side, who’s wearing what Hinata thinks to be an unnecessary amount of layers. His cheeks are still bright red with the cold, and the look is topped off with white fuzzy earmuffs. 

Hinata almost throws back a comment about bi-erasure just to spite Kuroo, but he stops himself. He's in too good a mood to even mock _Kuroo_. “You’re just in time for some pork!” He says instead, rubbing his hands together in excitement. 

“Ooh, nice. Get an extra one for me, I gotta go feed the vegetarian,” his head makes a slight gesture towards Kenma. They both wave and walk in the opposite direction, walking in unison in a way that looks rehearsed. Like they’re competing in a graceful three-legged race. 

When Hinata gets his tiny basket of ham (that Kageyama paid for, and Hinata didn’t even bother putting up a fight because of how much it thrilled him) they wander around the market, taking in the sights. In the middle of the outdoor space stood a tall forest house, where a giant illuminated Santa. “Take a bite,” Hinata demands, shoving the basket in Kageyama’s chest. 

He scrunches his nose. “No.” 

He feels like being difficult, and so he pushes. Because it’s fun. He’s having fun, and he can feel it from Kageyama, too. “Take a bite,” he repeats. 

“No.” Kageyama’s face twists, making him look meaner. 

Hinata pouts extra hard, but he turns his face away to be petty. “Fine. I’ll just enjoy this all to myself, and you can’t have any.” He takes an obnoxiously giant bite, groaning in bliss when he chews. He feels the meat juice drip down his chin, but he lets it happen. 

Kageyama is looking at him. His face is contorted in disgust. Despite this, his arm is still wrapped around Hinata’s shoulder, snug and solid and with seemingly no intention to let go. “You’re a dumbass.” 

As they’re walking, they come across a tunnel lined to the brim with yellow Christmas lights, illuminating the way with tiny twinkling bulbs. “Am I? Am I really a dumbass?” Hinata answers as they enter the tunnel. He finally swallows, twisting his face to sneer at Kageyama. 

Kageyama’s eyes flit upward. When Hinata follows his gaze, he sees it: they’ve walked under a mistletoe, green and lush, hanging on the tunnel ceiling. He snaps his gaze back at Kageyama, and when their eyes meet, all Hinata can do is admire the blue swimming around his pupils. In this light, the blue turns to crystal. 

They look at each other for such a long time that Hinata just lets himself whisper, “Let’s take a picture.” Kageyama raises an eyebrow, but Hinata holds out a hand. “No complaints!” He pulls out his old Polarioid—a birthday present from Kenma—and without warning, gets on his tiptoes and stretches out his arm. He takes a breath. “Smile!” He whispers before clicking the shutter. 

He feels Kageyama jump slightly when the flash goes off. (Whoops.) The little picture comes out, and Hinata’s fingers barely catch it before Kageyama pulls him in for a kiss. 

In that moment, standing in a tunnel of lights, kissing underneath a mistletoe while holding a basket of ham, with full awareness that his face is both greasy from the pork and chapped from the cold, with Kageyama running his fingers through his hair, warm and sure and _gentle_ , Hinata decides that this is it. This is the peak of his life. This the happiest he will ever feel, and everything he feels after this will just be a lesser shade. He’s done. He’s experienced what life has to offer, and the rest can just be an epilogue. 

* 

Kageyama’s mind is blank. 

Happiness, he’s learned, has a clever way of shutting up his brain. 

*

Eventually, Hinata is the one who pulls away. Mostly because the arm holding the pork hock was starting to cramp. Just after he pulls away, though, he gives a quick peck. He’s not gonna let Kageyama be the resident kisser between the two of them. This time, though, when they actually pull away, he lets himself ask the question. “Seriously, Tobio,” he starts, just so he can say his name. “What’s gotten into you?” 

Kageyama smiles— _actually smiles_ , flashing his perfect teeth and crinkling his perfect eyes. He opens his mouth to reply, but he gets interrupted from a voice up the tunnel. 

“Tobio-chan?” 

* 

His mother never let him watch romance movies, but from what he can gather, this moment is supposed to feel like a violin screeching to a halt. When the music stops, or something. But this doesn’t feel like that. 

The orchestra doesn’t stop working; his body does. He can’t breathe. He’s suddenly chilled to the bone, but his face feels red-hot. 

Because there he is, as if summoned from the darkest corners of his brain, where he’d desperately shoved away his voice. His face. His lazy smile... 

“Tsumu.” He replies, so smoothly and so contradictory to what he’s feeling that it feels automatic. Trained. Drilled into him like a puppy. 

One part of his brain barely registers that Miya is staring at the two of them, apparently waiting for something to happen. Things around Kageyama are happening under the rushing echo in his ears, making everything fuzzy and distant. 

The blond strands of his hair, smelling of his mint shampoo... 

“Hi,” Hinata says. 

The way he looked at every person like they were the most important thing in the world...

Hinata is nudging him. To speak, probaby. To do something. Anything. 

The way he tilts his head, making himself look vulnerable and curious. 

The way he says his name, with a higher pitch, even now. Like it was built in him to say it like this. Just how it was built in Kageyama to like it, in a sick and twisted way. 

It was Hinata’s voice, loud and slightly panicked, that snaps him back to reality. “I don't think we’ve met. I’m Hinata Shouyou.” He steps forward with his arm extended, and Kageyama snaps out of it just in time to lightly touch Hinata’s hand. A silent, but desperate plea to not go any closer. 

Kageyama steps forward, attempting to obstruct his view of Hinata. Miya doesn’t get to even _look_ at him. He’s already touched and smeared part of Kageyama. He doesnt get to touch this. 

Kageyama clears his throat to buy himself another second. He doesn’t want to think about what Hinata is thinking. He doesn’t want to think about his insides slowly shutting down. “What are you doing here?” 

Miya raises one eyebrow and lets his smile grow wider. He’s enjoying this. “Aren’t you going to introduce me to your cute friend?” He slouches his body to the side to try and see behind him, raises his hand, and wiggles his fingers in greeting. 

“We’re in a hurry.” Kageyama replies bitterly. 

Before he realizes what’s going on, Hinata has side-stepped Kageyama’s stance and is now striding towards Miya. “I’m Hinata Shouyou. Nice to meet you.” His voice is unreadable, and he reaches out and shakes Miya’s hand. 

“Pleasure. I’m Miya Atsumu.” This time, he flashes a full grin, and Kageyama wants to throw up. Miya looks at him for a split second before looking back at Hinata. “I’d love to stay and chat, Hinata, but I don’t think Tobio-chan would like that.” His smile gets wider and turns around. “Catch you boys later!” 

Kageyama watches him walk away and disappear into the thickening crowd. 

“Tobio,” Hinata says. Only now, Kageyama realizes his chest is heaving. His hands are balled into fists. His jaw is clenched so tightly that it might snap off his skull. 

_”Tobio,”_ Hinata repeats. His voice is firmer, more urgent. “Who was that?” 

Kageyama closes his eyes and tries to even out his breathing. “No one.” 

“You’re lying.” 

Kageyama doesn’t say anything. His heartbeat hasn’t slowed down. He just looks at Hinata, feeling completely helpless and pathetic. 

Exposed. 

Humiliated. 

“Why are you lying? Who was that?” Hinata’s voice is climbing higher, and Kageyama can feel the agony seeping in. “He was your captain. You played with him in high school. You’ve told me this, Tobio.” He’s getting angry. He grabs fistfuls of Kageyama’s sweater as he keeps talking, his words flowing like a river while Kageyama’s remain a barren wasteland. “Did...did you fight? Did you _date?_ ” 

That does it. The echo is there again, whooshing in his ears, isolating him from Hinata. From the rest of the world. “I have to go,” Kageyama suddenly says. He pries his fingers from Hinata’s gloved hand, turns around, and half-runs away. 

He stumbles through the bodies lingering throughout the festival. Now that he’s alone—or, some weak semblance of it—the echo dies down. What replaces it, though, is the voice. _His_ voice. 

_Tobio-chan._

_You can play any position you want. You’re incredible._

_My goody-two-shoes_. 

He feels two hands yank him backwards, _hard_ , causing him to stumble and almost fall to the ground. But he doesn’t, because someone catches him and pushes him back on his feet. He’s locked in place, however, by those same hands, gripping him to stay still. 

Kageyama’s pretty sure he can wrestle his way out of it, but hasn’t ever fought his way out of Hinata’s arms. He’s not gonna start doing it. Not even when his eyes are wide and scared and angry. Or when he’s gripping him so tightly that it’s probably leaving bruises. 

“Don’t do this.” 

_“Does seeing me make you happy?” Miya would ask him._

_“Always,” He would reply._

“I’m sorry,” Kageyama’s voice is barely above a whisper. 

He turns back around and sprints away. 

This time, nothing pulls him back.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hi friends! hope you're well. 
> 
> PLEASE NOTE: this chapter centres on an unhealthy past relationship, bordering on emotionally abusive. no actual abuse is featured in the text, but if that can be potentially harmful for you to read, please take care of yourself! xx I'm happy to give you the phrases to ctrl + f so that you can still read the chapter. just send me an ask at mildkatfics.tumblr.com/ask :) 
> 
> that's it. enjoy! xx

I have never had my heart broken  
(or sliced)  
but I have given it to you,  
beating  
and dripping with blood [...]  
but please, please, please  
be careful with me—  
be kind  
and gentle  
and soft  
with my insides  
I have given you the power  
to turn me inside out, my dear—  
please do not use it 

\- Savannah Brown, “organs.”

— 

Sometimes, when the pain is so bad, all you can do is to keep inflicting it on yourself, over and over, until you convince yourself you’ve gone numb. At least this time, you have control over what’s causing it. 

So that’s what Kageyama’s doing. Knowing full well the consequences, he collapses on the floor at the corner of his room, and opens the box. One by one, he takes each item out. Dried flowers, photos, tournament medals. Each of them a fingerprint of the past, of _him_ , that he’s desperately kept squashed in his brain all this time. 

Now, when his voice returns, when the memories start flowing in, Kagyama lets them run free. 

**tokyo, years ago**

Kageyama walked to Inarizaki High School on the first day of his first year with zero existing contacts. All he had was his hard head, wide eyes, and his immense potential as a volleyball player. When he showed up to that first practice and met the famous Miya Atsumu, the third-year star setter, Kageyama was a moth drawn to the brightest bulb he’d ever seen. But of course, it wasn’t just the volleyball that drew him closer. 

To say you had a crush on Miya Atsumu was, well... 

...it was more bizarre _not_ to. 

Kageyama didn’t notice it at first. Girls would sometimes linger around the gym, and Miya would rarely acknowledge them. When he did, he was always with his brother, never alone, and he’d always make some kind of joke. Sometimes, at the girls’ expense. 

And Kageyama would always watch those interactions closely. He didn’t understand why he couldn’t look away. He didn’t understand why it made his stomach twist whenever the girls would approach him. He didn’t understand why he’d exhale when Miya would walk away from girl after girl, each of their pretty faces folded over in disappointment. 

Near the end of practice, about two months into the semester, a volleyball hit him in the face. And it wasn’t just a light tap; it slammed, full force, squarely into his nose and caused him to fall on his ass. 

“Jesus Christ, are you okay?” He heard the voice, suddenly close to his ears. His eyes slowly blinked open, and the first thing he saw was Miya's face, chiseled and perfect, just centimeters away. 

The second thing he sees is the blood on his white shirt. 

“I’m fine,” Kageyama tried to say, but he feels the blood continue to gush down. 

Miya laughed at that. “You’re a terrible liar, you know? But I appreciate the bravery.” He took a handkerchief from his pocket, wiped it across his face, and used it to pinch Kageyama’s nose. “Here, hold it like this.” 

Kageyama obliged. Before he knew it, Miya was pulling him up, wrapping an arm around his waist, and walking them towards the door. “Sensei!” He called out. “I’m taking Tobio-kun to the clinic!” He didn’t even bother waiting for a reply before they stepped outside. 

They walked in silence for a few minutes before Miya spoke again. “Are you always this quiet?” 

Kageyama’s answer was muffled by the handkerchief, which he was pressing on his face. “No.” 

“Hm,” Miya cocked his head and smiled. “Do I make you nervous, then?” 

Kageyama didn’t answer him, but the thrill he was feeling from getting Miya’s undivided attention erupted like fireworks across his chest. He wanted more. 

And he got more. 

Pretty soon, Miya was walking him home after every practice, even though he lived in the opposite direction. Miya would start touching his shoulder, then his elbow, then his hand. They would stay behind after practice, when it was pitch black outside and the team already been there for hours, just to practice some more. Just the two of them. Miya would show him how to set like him, how to serve like him. 

Pretty soon after that, Miya would teach Kageyama how to kiss like him. 

Kageyama still didn’t understand a lot of things. But during those days, he knew this: He was in love, and Miya loved him back. Miya hated everyone, except him. And that was the most addictive feeling in the world. 

Soon, everything in his life became fast and intense. That’s what it was like to be with Miya Atsumu. 

Kageyama still didn’t understand a lot of things. He was eager, and determined, and would do anything to learn something new. He was also only fifteen years old. 

Miya, at eighteen, knew this. And so he taught him a million little lessons, in volleyball and beyond: 

_If you want to be a setter, you make everyone follow your every whim and desire._

_Only speak to people who are worth your time._

_If someone can’t hit your tosses, they are a bad player who doesn’t deserve to stand on the court._

_You shouldn’t need other friends if you properly love your boyfriend._

He also bought Kageyama presents. And bought him flowers. And would hold his waist while they walked on the street. And Kageyama loved him, and ate it all up. He followed every tip, every command, every rule. Soon, they spent every moment together. 

_“My goody-two-shoes,”_ Miya would call him. 

_“Do you love me?”_ Miya would ask him. 

_“Do you trust me?”_

_”Yes,”_ Kageyama would say, every time. _”Yes. Yes. Yes.”_

Miya would say all these things, kiss his forehead, and Kageyama believed it was love. 

If he had friends, they would have told him it was unhealthy. 

If he did anything else in his life beyond volleyball with his boyfriend, he would have seen that there are other things to live for. 

If anyone else in his life cared about him, he wouldn’t have given everything up to keep Miya happy. 

When Miya graduated later that year and went off to university, it only took a couple weeks before Kageyama spiralled out of control. With every missed call, every voicemail not returned, every date cancelled, Kageyama soon felt the darkness of isolation plague everything around him. Without Miya, he had no one. He couldn’t eat, focus on school, or get out of bed. He could barely play volleyball. 

On Christmas break, Kageyama cried, begged, pleaded with Miya to stay with him. Miya held his face and looked in his eyes, and Kageyama saw nothing behind them. 

“What about this,” he said, chipper and amused while looking at Kageyama’s blubbering face. He tilted his chin up, forcing him to look him in the eye. “Let’s take a break, hm? I go do my thing, and you do yours. We’ll see where we’re at when you’re done school. Is that okay with you?” 

“Yes,” Kageyama had whispered in response. Because with Miya, that was all he knew to say. 

But it wasn’t okay. And that became apparent very, very quickly.

His downward spiral was tight, narrow, and instant. He would go through the days like a limp ghost, tetherless and hollow. Fresh off as Inarizaki’s starting setter, at one of their biggest matches of the tournament, he was missing sets and serves and even the most basic passes. When he was benched, little did he know that that was the last time he’d play on the team’s official match for the rest of the year. 

He crashed and burned, in all the ways imaginable. 

**present day**

If Kageyama can crawl five feet to his bed, maybe he can fall asleep for the night. He doesn’t know what time it is, and some faint part of his brain is telling him he hasn’t eaten since lunch. 

Because he doesn’t give a shit, he stays exactly where he is. 

* 

“Tell me what happened again,” Kenma says. Him and Kuroo are sitting on one side of the train on their way home, while Hinata is sitting across from them. 

“I don’t even know how to make sense of it,” Hinata mutters. There’s no one else on their carriage, which allows him to fold in half, sitting with his head in his hands. 

After Kageyama left him in the middle of the market, he wandered around like a lost child until he finally found the two of them and asked to go home. Hinata had tried to explain, but he kept coming up at a loss. Now, he tries again. “We were...kissing under this mistletoe and then suddenly this _guy_ shows up and Kageyama just...changed. It’s like he saw a ghost.” He looks up and blinks away his dizziness when they get to their stop. 

They file out of the train and emerge from the station. “Leaving you was a dick move. I’m sorry, kiddo,” Kuroo says.

Hinata doesn’t respond. He’s already fantasizing about going home and passing out on his bed. He shoves his hands in his—Kageyama’s—jacket pocket. His hands feel something shoved inside. When he pulls it out, he sees the polaroid, now fully developed, illuminated by the moonlight between his fingers. 

“If I know Kageyama, and I think I do, I think he just needed some time. He’s always so deep in thought...” Kuroo is still talking, but Hinata’s mind is starting to pick up. He continues to stare at the polaroid. His own dumb, happy face. Kageyama’s lovely eyes, even when wide and caught off guard. He looks at these two people, happy and _normal_. 

Then he’s running. 

He barely registers Kuroo and Kenma calling after him. His mind is only on the sidewalk, and his feet, and the directions to Kageyama’s dorm room. 

Hinata can’t remember the last time he ran. His body, he realizes, is still lightning-fast to respond to things happening around him. But he’s easily winded now. He’s quickly out of breath, his legs feel heavy. 

But he thinks of Kageyama, or this _shadow_ of Kageyama, standing frozen with shock, pulling away and disappearing between his fingers. Then he thinks of Kageyama, _his_ Kageyama, feather-light and buoyant under his touch, happy under his presence. And he’s not letting that go. Not this easily. 

All he has to do is push. 

* 

Kageyama jolts awake when he hears his door bang open, and Hinata is suddenly in his room. He didn’t even realize he had fallen asleep; all he can think about is the soreness throughout his body from falling asleep on the floor. His pounding headache. His dry throat. Hinata flicked on the lights, and Kageyama grimaces from the unwelcome brightness. “Shouyou?” He croaks out. “What are you doing here?” He scrambles to stand up, nearly tripping on some loose pieces of paper, and that’s when he realizes the box remains wide open. Its contents are scattered all over the floor, laid out in the open. 

Hinata doesn’t answer. Kageyama watches him take it in, his eyes wide and pained; everything Miya left behind, everything Kageyama couldn’t throw away. An exhibition of his sad, pathetic life. One he never wanted _anyone_ to see, let alone the boy in front of him. It’s so much. It’s all too much. 

He can suddenly feel anger, ice cold and desperate, rising in his throat. “Why are you here?” 

“Why am I here?” Hinata repeats, breathless and in disbelief. “Why did _you_ leave? What’s...what is all this?” His hands frantically gesture towards the box and its contents. 

His head is pounding even harder. He rubs his eyes, pressing his wrists against them to block out the light. “You need to leave.” 

“No. _No!_ ” Hinata is shouting now, causing Kageyama’s head to snap back at him. He can feel his chest heaving. His hands are balled into fists. “ _Talk to me, Tobio._ Answer my questions. Why did you run away when Miya Atsumu showed up? What the fuck is all of _this?_ ” He steps towards Kageyama, eyes blazing. He steps all over the contents. On the pieces of paper, on the dried flowers. On the medals. 

“Stop,” Kageyama can hear a tremble in his voice. “You’re gonna break them.” 

Hinata roots his feet to the ground. His face is unreadable. “Okay. Let me help you clean it up.” He bends down and starts shoving everything back in the box. Crumpling the papers, gripping the flowers by the petals. 

Kageyama’s pulse quickens. “Don’t,” he says. “Please.” 

“No. I’m gonna do this, and you’re gonna tell me everything.” He gathers up a pile in his hands and shoves it carelessly aside. Hinata keeps going, keeps _pushing_ , and it’s all gone too far. Kageyama’s hands start to shake. 

“What _the fuck_ is the matter with you?” He shoves Hinata to the side, and Hinata grabs the front of his shirt. 

”What’s the matter with _you_?” 

__“You can’t do this, Shouyou,” he spits out. “You can’t just show up here, and yell at me, and fucking push and _push_ and think you can get whatever the fuck you want!” He’s yelling, too. He’s grabbing Hinata’s shoulders and shaking them, and Hinata lets him. His eyes look like they can start a forest fire. _ _

__“Oh, I can get whatever I want? Is that what you think? I just want my fucking boyfriend to talk to me!” He shoves Kageyama backwards, _hard._ “I open up to you, spill my guts about everything I hide away. Because I _trust_ you. Because I thought we _speak_ to each other. And you have all these things from a different guy...a guy that clearly still haunts you, and what? You’re just gonna keep _lying_ to me? After I opened up to you like that?” _ _

__“That’s different.” His words tumble out of his mouth before he realizes, hot and heavy in the air._ _

__“What?” Hinata’s voice, exploding just a few seconds ago, is now barely above a whisper._ _

__“Don’t compare that to this. You have no idea, Shouyou.”_ _

__“What are you talking about?” Hinata’s voice is rising, tears welling up in his eyes. “What are you saying?”_ _

__Sometimes, when the pain is so bad, all you can do is to keep inflicting it on yourself._ _

__When you’ve exhausted that option, there’s always Option B: inflict it on someone else. “I’m saying you should have gotten over that a long time ago.”_ _

__Tears run down Hinata’s face, and he makes no move to wipe them away. He just looks at Kageyama, and Kageyama stares back._ _

__They stay like that for a long time, and Kageyama wonders if either of them will say anything._ _

__They don’t._ _

__Finally, Hinata nods as if he just got an answer to something. His eyes are swollen, and his cheeks are flushed. He takes off his jacket— _Kageyama’s_ jacket—places it on his bed, and walks out the door. _ _

__Kageyama blinks at the jacket. Something tumbled out of the pocket when it landed on the bed. He sees their polaroid picture, mocking him with their joy, just sitting there above everything else._ _

__He doesn’t bother turning off the lights when he crashes on his bed. He passes out in the brightness._ _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> whew.


	9. Chapter 9

I can measure how sad I am   
by how afraid I am of the dark   
rather, I mean, what’s in the dark  
counting hearts and stomach flops   
every stair creek when everyone’s asleep   
except me and my head and my shaky hands 

\- Savannah Brown, “haunted”

— 

Hinata stirs awake when the sunlight hits his face. He shifts his head,and something in his neck twists in pain. His head hurts. He barely got any sleep. When he tosses to his side in irritation, trying to pass back out, he sees Kenma, lying on the edge of his bed, just scrolling casually on his phone. As if he just lays down with Hinata and waits for him to wake up all the time. 

“What.” Hinata grumbles. It’s the most his brain can do. He turns to the other side before Kenma can respond, where he sees Kuroo, just staring up at the ceiling, with one arm bent and serving as his pillow. Hinata wonders how he didn’t wake up when two grown men joined him on his twin-sized bed. It also explains the soreness. With nowhere to turn to, he flips onto his stomach, pressing his face flat against the pillow. “What do you two want?” He muffles. 

“Just here to make sure you’re still breathing,” He hears Kenma reply.

“So you two are my bodyguards now? Or do you prefer being nurses?” Even with the tiny speck of poison that his words carried on his tongue, they evaporate before he even finishes his sentence. That’s the beauty of having friends like them. He can be petulant in his pain, and they will absorb it. 

“Hey now, don’t be like that,” Kuroo says. Hinata feels a poke on his side. “I believe you have class in an hour.” 

“Not going,” he mumbles. 

He feels Kuroo sigh next to him, but both him and Kenma stay quiet. The silence stays long enough that Hinata starts drifting back to sleep, but Kuroo says something that pulls him back awake. “I found out why Miya was there. At the Christmas market.” 

Hinata’s eyes open. He had come home last night, distraught and torn to pieces, and told Kuroo and Kenma everything. They listened, and made him drink water, and stayed with him in his room until he passed out. 

Kuroo keeps talking. “His team is in town for the tournament. They made it to the next round, so it’s us versus them for the semifinals.” Kuroo’s tone is light, but Hinata can feel his eyes on him. “It’s not for another two weeks, but I guess he came early.” 

So Miya Atsumu will be in town for another two weeks. And he will be playing Kuroo and Kageyama’s team. 

Not that it matters to him anymore. “That’s nice,” Hinata replies. 

Another pause stretches out between the three of them before Kuroo starts to get up. “Well, I’m off. Morning practice.” He feels his hand ruffle his hair. “Take it easy, kiddo.” 

Even as their apartment door closes, neither he nor Kenma say anything. When Hinata feels like he’s about to be suffocated by his pillow, he flips onto his back and stares at his ceiling, nestling in the warmth that Kuroo left behind. 

“You know Kageyama didn’t mean it,” Kenma suddenly says. He doesn’t bother specifying what he means, and Hinata doesn’t bother asking. 

“You don’t know that.” 

“True. And what he said was gross and wrong. But you said you’ve never seen him like that before, right? And that he was passed out on the floor when you got to his room?” When Hinata doesn’t answer, he keeps talking. “That’s heavy stuff, Shouyou. If I know Kageyama, and I think I do, it might have been his pain talking, and not him.” 

“Yeah,” Hinata breathes. He shifts again, this time on his side, facing away from Kenma. “I thought I knew him, too.”

Eventually, he does get out of bed. That’s the crazy thing about having things fall apart around you: everything else keeps going. Everything stays the same. Which means he still has to study. 

He only feels a little stressed about walking up to Renaissance, because he’s almost a hundred percent sure Kageyama won’t be there. He hasn’t recharged his cell phone since it died the night before, and he has no intention of doing it anytime soon. He can’t face Kageyama. Not yet. 

Still, stepping into the cafe, smelling the coffee, and dropping his bag on the chair makes him feel a little more at ease. This—pulling out his book and setting it on the table—he knows. This—being by himself—will not change. 

He lasts five seconds of reading Shakespeare’s Sonnet 130 before his mind starts to wander. To the open box. The flowers, the papers. The scraps of a past heart. 

_I’m saying you should have gotten over that a long time ago._

The lead of Hinata’s pencil snaps. 

He takes a deep breath, and wonders how much space is left in his brain. If he has the capacity to push down yet another ghost, a fresh wave of hurt. 

_”Help!”_ Hinata’s head snaps up when he hears Sugawara’s voice. It came from behind the counter, through an open door. 

He looks around. There’s no one else in the cafe, so he stands up and walks up to the counter. “Suga-san?” He calls out. He’s trying to crane his neck to see past the door. All he sees are a bunch of boxes and store supplies. No one else in sight. “Suga-san, are you okay?” 

“Hinata? Is that you? Get over here! Please! Just lift the metal latch on the side!” 

When he obliges, his hands are slightly trembling as adrenaline starts to course through his veins. “Suga-san, what’s wrong?” He steps behind the counter and into the stock room, ready to call an ambulance or perform CPR or scream— 

He stops when sees Kageyama, standing against the corner, looking at him with guilt. 

He feels his face contort into a frown. He turns around and sees Suga, standing behind the door, pressing his palms together in apology. “Sorry, Hinata-kun.” He gives him a shy smile, steps back out to the counter, and closes the door behind him. 

He glares at Kageyama, anger rising in his chest. “So, what? Are you kidnapping me? You got Suga-san to be your henchman?” 

“Don’t be mad at Sugawara-san, I made him do it. Your phone kept going to voicemail,” Kageyama replies. He steps forward. “Shouyou...I’m sorry.” Hinata can see the dark circles under his eyes, his hair disheveled into different directions. His hand almost reaches out and fixes it without command. He clamps it to his side. 

Hinata turns around and reaches for the door, but before he knew it, Kageyama lurched forward to block the knob. “What the fuck, Tobio?” 

“We were together in high school,” Kageyama blurts out. 

Up close, Hinata can see that his eyes are bloodshot. 

* 

Before he can even take another breath, Kageyama keeps talking. He’s too desperate to stop Hinata from leaving, so afraid he’ll push him away from the door. “We were together for almost a year, and I loved him, but it’s all in the past.” Kageyama looks him in the eye, his insides brimming with desperation. “It’s all in the past,” he repeats. At some point during this rushed, nonsensical ramble, he realizes this is the first time he ever said any of this out loud. 

But when Hinata replies, his voice is hard. “Tell me the full story.” 

Kageyama feels his gut drop, his throat close up. He blinks to try and focus, but his brain is already spinning out of control. He shakes his head, already basking in his own failure. “I can’t. At least not yet. I’m sorry.” 

Kageyama closes his eyes to try and gain back some composure, but when he opens them, Hinata is already halfway out the door. 

* 

Even now, as Hinata lets the door swing close behind him, stuffs everything into his bag and leaves the cafe, he knew that he was being unfair to the boy he loves. 

Because Hinata is bad at being in love. Almost as bad as he is with handling pain. 

“This is really unsettling,” Kenma mutters. 

Hinata looks up. He didn’t realize he had completely zoned out while they were walking. He notices that they’re only two blocks away from home, which means he was zoned out for most of their walk from the grocery store. He shakes his head slightly, attempting to clear it. “What’s unsettling?” 

“You. Being so quiet.” He keeps his eyes forward as they walk, hugging the brown paper bag.

“Oh. Well, what do you want me to say?” 

Kenma shrugs. “I just don’t like not knowing what you’re thinking.” 

“I thought you could always tell. You and Kuroo’s ESP, or whatever.” He kicks a pebble down the road. 

“Not with you,” he feels Kenma look at him. “Because you always say it out loud.” 

Hinata shifts the grocery bags in his arms. Before he can reply, he stops in his tracks when he sees a giant poster hanging near the campus gates. 

_MEN’S VOLLEYBALL SEMI-FINALS_  
We are proud to host the most exciting match of the year!   
Come support our boys on their road to Nationals! 

Above the blurb sits the splash photo: a photo of five of the boys’ volleyball team, with Kuroo at the front, and four of the guys standing behind him in a carefully composed promotional shot. Of course, on Kuroo’s left, there’s Kageyama, standing in a way that only shows the profile of his face. They’re all standing on a loose triangle formation, in the middle of their gym, with the lights cleverly contrasted to make them glow. 

It’s the kind of flashy praise reserved for sports teams that him and Kenma love to mock. They’ve spent countless nights on their couch, as Kuroo listened with amusement, as they listed all the things they hated about the culture of sports in universities. All the grandiosity, self-importance, and _money_ poured in. 

Even so, he’s not surprised at all when Kenma carefully pulls the tape away from its corners, takes it off the pole, rolls it up, and tucks it under his arm. Hinata feels his lips tug up into a smile. “Sap,” he teases. 

Kenma actually smiles back, a little. “Kuroo showed me the photo already, but it’s the first time I’ve seen this one out around campus. I could tell he’s thrilled.” 

When they pass the gate and walk deeper through campus towards their apartment, Hinata sees that the whole courtyard is lined with huge, flashy posters. Different variations of the same message: semi-finals in two weeks, the volleyball team is very cool, and this is a very big deal. 

When he takes it all in, Hinata realizes that Kenma, Kuroo, and _his fucking boyfriend_ have probably been talking about these posters, this game, _this tournament_ without him this whole time. Because that’s what he wants. Because he still can’t handle it. Hinata hasn’t even realized that their team has made it this far. That without him noticing, the campus has been building excitement for his boyfriend’s team. His _best friend’s_ team. 

Guilt twists in his stomach. “I’ve been a bad friend, haven’t I?” 

“A little.” Sugarcoating was never Kenma’s forte. 

Hinata lets the guilt fester a little bit more. Before he realizes what he’s about to ask, it slips past his lips. “How are the games?” 

“The school got the marching band this year, in addition to the cheerleaders, so it’s much grosser and extravagant,” Kenma answers evenly, which makes Hinata laugh. He pauses for a second before he adds, with a genuine smile, “But they’re really fun.” 

“Yeah?” 

“Yeah.” Another pause. “Would you like to know how Tobio plays?” 

Hinata inhales, and before he lets himself react, he wills his reply out of his mouth. “He’s brilliant, isn’t he?” 

“He really is. It’s one thing when I watch them practice, but during games, I couldn’t believe my eyes,” Kenma’s wide eyes are focused up ahead, lost in thought. “The guys are still having trouble matching with him, sometimes. Kuroo would even ask me sometimes how I dealt with Lev, back in the day. Remember him? The speed of his sets, his guts...Kageyama needs to learn how to serve his spikers better, but...it reminded me of you, Shouyou. Back in high school, when you were terrifying to play with. I kind of think...” Kenma hesitates and looks at him, waiting to see if Hinata wants him to keep going.

He holds his breath and wills himself not to panic. He can do this. He can talk about a fucking unviersity volleybal team, like it was the weather or Final Fantasy or Early Modern Lit, with his best friend, on an empty path. He exhales. “Keep going.” 

“I think you would have been his perfect spiker. If you two found each other in high school...I can see it so clearly. It would have been special, I think.” 

Hinata shuts his eyes. He can feel his throat closing up, tears only a thought spiral away. But he forces them to open, and looks at Kenma. When he replies, a single tear trickles down his cheek. “That would have been fun, wouldn’t it?” He wipes the tear away with his thumb. 

Kenma reaches over and squeezes his hand. “Yeah, it really would have.” 

* 

Kageyama had a plan. 

It was working really well. Sugawara-san’s eyes practically sparkled when he asked him for his help, and he only felt a little guilty about engaging in a conspiracy to trick Hinata into hearing his apology. An apology that he practiced, over and over, in front of a mirror in his room: 

_I’m sorry about what I said. I didn’t mean it._

_You are the strongest, kindest, most resilient person I know. Everyday, you teach me how to be a better person._

_I love everything about you. And it’s all real. Everything about you is real, and I want to keep learning it._

But the second he saw Hinata, gorgeous and lovely under the fluorescence of the Renaissance stockroom, he forgot everything he wanted to say. Because his hair was disheveled and flat, his eyes tired and red, his skin almost gray. And he wanted to reach out to him, because he wants, so badly, to just make it better. 

To touch his hands. Run his fingers through his hair. Get him to say what he’s thinking. 

Because he misses him. 

Because this thing he feels—this intensity, this longing, the joy that clings onto him like a phantom limb—might just be love. The real thing, this time. 

But of course, all he did was make it worse. 

He can’t think about saying the words to Hinata without feeling the whiplash of his own self-hatred, convincing him that everything he had to say wasn’t worth being said. He can’t think about saying all the reasons why he loves him without quickly repressing everything before it leaves his mouth, his own reflexes a self-destruct button. He clears his throat. Tries it one more time, alone, in his unmade bed. 

“I’m in love with you.” His voice comes out raspy and pathetic, and everything inside him feels wrong. 

Kageyama shuts his eyes and grunts in frustration and throws his pillow across the room. The pillow lands somewhere on his desk, followed by a bunch of soft thuds on the floor. He peeks to see the damage, and sees his—Hinata’s—books now scattered on the ground. 

A fresh fleck of guilt sparks in his gut. He rolls off the bed and reaches over to pick them up, and pauses when he sees the polaroid. He stares at it, at these strangers looking back at him, and all these books that he’s read, back when he didn’t understand the feeling. Back when Hinata would read him his essays, excerpts from his class readings, and Kageyama never wanted him to stop. 

_”But how do you know that the author really meant that?” Kageyama would ask him. “What if it’s not that deep?_

_”That’s not the point, dummy. It doesn’t matter what the author intended. You insert meaning where you want. You can do whatever you like when you’re the one writing.”_

That’s what Hinata does: he inserts meaning into everything he does. Into Kageyama’s life. 

He grabs a notebook and pen from the desk and opens it, ignoring the mess. He frowns when he catches a glimpse of his Finance homework, and flips near the end where the pages are untouched. He only feels a little stupid when he starts writing on the page. It’s not like he has much dignity left. 

He takes a breath and thinks about everything he wants to say. He’s gonna be shit at this. But god knows he will try to get it out. 

*

Twice, Hinata wanted to call him. 

The first time was three days later, when he had read so much Marlowe that a soft pounding had started against his temples. He was staring at the empty chair in front of him, and the quiet of Renaissance is starting to feel oppressive rather than peaceful. He reached for his phone without thinking, wanting to text Kageyama about anything. Everything. His thumb froze where it hovered over the keyboard, and his whole body slumped forward when he put the phone back down. 

The next time was yesterday. 

Hinata flopped down next to Kenma on their couch, his bowl of curry over rice nestled on his lap. “Shouldn’t Kuroo be back yet?” 

“Practice is running late. They’re going til 8 every day ‘til the tournament, apparently.” 

There it was again: the guilt. He imagined the team going through receiving drills, maybe three-on-threes. He pictured Kageyama, concentrated and gifted and perfect. Would he be doing receiving drills? Probably. He would want to practice everything. He probably has a killer serve. The kind that the other team would dread as the rotation would go on. Because he’s good at everything he does. And Hinata has missed out on this huge part of his life. And now he’s gonna miss out on all of him. 

Kenma’s voice was even when he speaks, keeping his eyes trained on his book. “Call him, Shouyou.” 

Hinata didn’t look up from his food. Suddenly, he wasn’t hungry anymore. 

Kenma took the bowl from his lap and started eating the curry. They sit there like that in comfortable silence while Hinata watched him eat. “Do you think he’ll answer?” 

Kenma just looked at him, actually bothering to roll his eyes. 

Hinata reached into his back pocket and pulled out his phone. But just like so many things in his frayed, flailing brain, he panicked. He gathered every thought floating around, every speck of hope, every drop of dread, and tried to push it down. 

He tossed his phone onto the coffee table, and didn’t touch it again all night. 

* 

This was a terrible idea. 

Kageyama is staring at all the pieces of paper he’s ripped and used and tossed to the side, at all the shit he’s scribbled down, and wants to curl up and pass out. Why did he think he could do this? 

He hisses internally when his alarm goes off. It’s not even light outside—six am practice means you walk to the gym in pitch darkness. He shoves the pieces of paper in his gym bag, throws on a clean shirt, and drags himself out the door. 

“Kageyama!” Kuroo’s voice booms across the gym. Everyone else flinches. “I could see you hesitating. If you want to go for the B quick, just go for it!” 

“Yes sir!” Kageyama calls back. He’s breathing heavily, warm and limber from the drills, but he doesn’t feel good. He feels like his brain is reacting three seconds slower to everything around him. He finds himself thinking about sleeping, or exams, or asking Kuroo about— 

“Left!” Yamamoto’s voice pulls him out. Shit. He didn’t even notice the gameplay had started. He wills himself to focus. Kindaichi had received the ball nicely, and now it’s now spiralling perfectly above his head. He shifts his feet, lifts his arms to brace for the set. Yamamoto is on the left, already poised for a running start, so this should be simple. Third tempo, nice and high. The gym lights are really bright. Too bright. He suddenly can’t keep track of the ball. He squints, blinks, re-plants his feet— 

The ball falls squarely on his head. 

Everyone is quiet. When the whistle blows, giving the point to the other side, Kageyama braces his hands on his knees and tries to catch his breath. 

“Kageyama,” his coach starts. He lifts his head up to look at him, bracing himself. “Take a breather. Chill out for a bit.” 

He nods once, and gives him a slight bow. “I’m sorry.” When he walks off the court, he passes the bench and goes straight to the locker room. He flops down on the seat, takes a sip from his water bottle, and before he can stop himself, opens his gym bag to grab his phone. 

He wants to call him. Just to hear his voice. Just to ask him about exams. 

Then he sees the mess of papers he stuffed in there this morning, all the crap he tried to write. He slumps down, resting his head on his hands. 

He hears the door open and senses someone sit next to him. “So. You’re a mess.” 

Kageyama straightens when he hears Kuroo’s voice. “Yeah.” He makes sure to look him in the eyes when he says, “But I’ll be fine to play for the semi-finals. I promise. I just need more practice.” 

Kuroo gives him a half-smile and shakes his head. “Wrong. What you need is to sleep, eat, and pull yourself together.” 

Kageyama nods, but doesn’t reply. The question is simmering on his tongue: _“Will Hinata forgive me?”_ But he knows that he can’t. He keeps his mouth shut. 

“He’ll come around, you know.” 

Kageyama’s head whips to look at him, his eyes wide. At that moment, he feels it creep back into his chest, pulling everything in and lighting it up: hope. “He will?” 

Kuroo’s eyes burn into him for a few seconds, studying his face, before he nods. “Try again. And it’ll happen.” 

Kageyama bites his lip and looks down at his feet. _Do not cry in front of your captain. Do not cry in front of your captain, you little shit._ “Thank you, Kuroo-san.” He manages to say, his voice quiet. 

He doesn’t know how Kuroo will respond. Suddenly, he feels his hand shove his head to the side with so much force that it causes his whole body to topple over. “That’s for being stupid. Don’t do it again, yeah?” 

Kageyama nods solemnly. “Yes, sir.” 

Kuroo shoves him off the bench. “Good. Now go back out there. Coach just wanted to show everyone you’re not his favourite. And if you want, we can stay after practice with Yamamoto so you can get your shit together.” 

Kageyama stands and gives him a bow. “Thank you, Kuroo-san.” He turns around and walks out the door, hands already tingling to touch the ball again. 

He idly wonders, at the back of his mind, if he left his gym bag open.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> we're in the home stretch, my dudes! If you noticed the change in chapter count from 10 to 11, that's because I decided to post the epilogue as its own chapter rather than as a part of chapter 10. I will be posting both chapter 10 and the epilogue on thursday. I can't believe we're almost at the end! ;--; 
> 
> take care x


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> and here we are. thank you for making it this far, and I am so excited to end this story with you. I really, truly hope you will like it. 
> 
> enjoy! x

Twice, Hinata wanted to call him. 

Now, at the crack of dawn, when everything feels surreal in the pale darkness, Hinata’s phone is once again in his hand. He had ducked out into their balcony, freezing in the cold. He’s definitely gonna do it, _definitely absolutely_ gonna call Kageyama. 

He doesn’t move. 

He hears the door slide open behind him. He doesn’t have to look to know who it is; Kenma hasn’t woken up before ten since high school. “Hey, kiddo,” Kuroo says. 

Hinata actually smiles. “Hey. What are you doing up?” He didn’t hear Kuroo get home last night until nine, when he was already drifting off to sleep. 

Kuroo just shrugs. “Can’t really sleep lately. Captain stuff.” 

Hinata grimaces at himself. Once again, his best friend can’t talk to him about this huge, exciting thing in his life. Because he can’t handle a remotely uncomfortable conversation. And that makes him a shitty friend. But he wants to be better. “Congratulations on making it to the semi-finals. I’m sorry I haven’t said that until now.” He looks up at the sky, gradually turning golden. 

Kuroo punches him in the arm. “Do you ever get tired of bearing every single fault in the universe?” 

That makes him laugh. Probably for the first time in a while. “I’m fucking exhausted, to be honest.” 

“Seriously, though. How are you holding up?” He hops on the railing and sits right on the edge. 

Hinata ignores the instinct to scold him. “I keep wanting to call him.” 

“...but?” 

“I don’t know. I don’t know what to say. I don’t know if I should apologize for acting this way, or make him apologize again for saying what he said. I don’t know how we can move forward if I can’t even talk about this huge part of his life. And he’s clearly not ready to talk about his past with Miya. I just...I don’t know if we can go on like this.” He presses his face against his palms. He can feel Kuroo’s gold eyes on him. Seeing as though his dignity is thrown out the window with him at this point, he indulges in saying a forbidden thought out loud. “I wish we could be like you and Kenma.” 

God, he means it. Kuroo and Kenma don’t have individual baggage that stops them from having a happy relationship. Kuroo and Kenma are like gravity, or rain, or the sunrise. Hinata, so badly, wants to know what it’s like. To love easily and with abandon. 

He keeps his face buried in his face, unsure of how Kuroo will respond. He can hear him shift on the railing, and when he replies a few moments later, Hinata is caught completely by surprise. “I tried to break up with Kenma when I graduated high school.” 

Bewildered, he looks back up at him. Kuroo chuckles nervously and continues. “Yeah. I asked Kenma to not tell you. It was when you and him were joined at the hip, and I thought...I was convinced that he’d fallen in love with you.” Hinata opens and scrambles to assure him that Kenma _had not_ , that they were _never like that_ , and that it was _always Kuroo,_ but Kuroo holds up a hand before any words come out his mouth. “I know. Believe me, I know. But back then, I was convinced that that was the case. And I was so sure that breaking up with him was the right thing. That I would make him happy.” 

Hearing this knocked the air from Hinata’s lungs. Him and Kenma _had_ been inseparable, but Kuroo was always there too. It took the two of them longer to get closer, mostly because Hinata was deathly afraid of him. So many times, Kenma would assure him that he had nothing to be worried about. 

Learning many years later that he did, in fact, have something to worry about—well, it sends a shock down your spine. “Did you hate me? Back then?” 

When Kuroo smiles at that moment, Hinata could only see sadness. “No. You make him happy.” He hops off the rail and hugs Hinata from behind. The gesture sends warmth in Hinata’s chest. Such acts of affection were rare with Kuroo, but wonderful. “The point is, I was wrong. I fucked up. Turns out, I was wrong about the person who I thought I knew inside and out. And it almost cost me everything.” 

“If Kenma hadn’t set you straight?” 

“You’re damn right. A common theme in both our lives, isn’t it?” The sun is almost completely out now, a full sunrise now splayed out for both of them to enjoy. Hinata stares at the reds, and pinks, tiny flecks of purple from the night, all splintering off to give way for the glittering gold. “This hard shit you deal with when you love a person—that doesn’t go away, shouyou. It’s work, and that’s all we can ever do. You just get better at it with time.” 

Kuroo slides open the door. With one foot back in the apartment, he turns back to hinata. “And hey, I just gotta get this out of the way. For my precious junior. Hear him out, will you?” He hesitates, rubbing the back of his neck, before continuing. “He’d kill me for doing this, but here.” He reaches into his hoodie pocket and tosses something towards Hinata. When he catches it, Kuroo ducks back inside and closes the sliding door behind him. 

It’s a bundle of loose pieces of paper, folded messily all together. Hinata runs his fingers along the wrinkled sheets and slowly unravels its contents. 

The papers all flutter to the ground the second Hinata unfolds them. When he bends over and picks them up, though, there’s no clear order. It’s about eight sheets of paper, with varying scribbles, all forming vague lines and sections. 

He sees his name on one of the pieces, and so he reads that first: 

_Shouyou._

_The light that comes through to my room reminds me of you.  
It wouldn’t let me sleep past eight, even though we—  
I  
—stayed awake until three in the morning,  
listening to you talk.  
I still do that. Even if you’re not there.  
It helps me sleep._

The next piece of paper: 

_Line breaks are confusing.  
How are you meant to know  
When something has ended,  
And another thing begins? _

_Either way,  
Poems are much better when  
they come out of your mouth. _

_Shakespeare’s sonnets end in couplets  
But I know you like to break the rules._

The next one: 

_I want you to know that I can explain.  
I can explain everything.  
I will do whatever you’d like.  
It’s just gonna take some time.  
Because I don’t know what’s going on with me.  
And I want you to know that,  
even though I try so hard to hide it.  
Because you have a right to know,  
even though nothing that surrounds you,  
nothing you touch,  
can ever be ruined. _

_I want that, Shouyou.  
I want to be ruined by you._

The next: 

_I am a mess.  
But I promise you this:  
I will tell you, come more time and hope. _

_Give me another chance,  
And I will give you everything in return. _

_I adore you:_  
The boy who knocked me to the ground, and asked to buy me coffee.  
I adore you. I adore you. I adore you. 

There are other lines, other verses, other attempted couplets. Some are crossed out with a neat line. Some are completely covered in a sheet of blotted ink. Some sheets have rips and holes. In others, you can see dents from where the pen was pressed too hard. Some scribbles are jammed in an empty corner, while others are right at the middle of a page, with nothing but blank space surrounding it. It stretches on between his fingers: Kageyama’s messy handwriting, his messy words and raw materials, all scraped from the walls of his insides. 

Hinata is trying to read them all, but he’s struggling so much that he’s forced to stop. He didn’t realize he’d started to cry. 

* 

Kageyama is doubled over his gym bag, tossing out every old t-shirt, loose socks, random worksheets he had to reprint, and frowns at the mess in front of him, illuminated by the morning light. 

Where the fuck did his papers go? 

* 

When Hinata puts down the papers and tries to neatly pile them together, he realizes his hands are shaking. His heart is racing. He blinks at the small pile, crumpled and creased, and looks back up at the sky. 

The sun is now completely up, all gold and bright flashing from the horizon, making him squint. 

Once again, he’s running. 

Or, at least, he runs across their tiny balcony, until he’s fumbling to unlatch the knob. 

“Kuroo!” Hinata yells, tripping over their sliding door and scrambling to crawl back into the apartment. He hears the shower going at the end of the hall, so he runs to their bathroom and starts banging on the door. “Kuroo! Kuroo!” 

The door flies open, and Hinata sees Kuroo’s head, bubbling with shampoo, poking out. __**“What?”**

“What time does the game start?” 

* 

Kageyama frowns at the locked gym door. Kuroo did say last night the gym would be closed all morning as the staff sets up for the game. 

_”Don’t even think about trying to practice more. Sleep. Rest. And don’t be stupid,” he had ordered everyone when they broke off._

Kageyama tugs on the door one more time, as if that would magically open it, but it doesn’t. He really did want to listen to Kuroo, but with his papers missing, he feels a notch more antsy. Another step towards a complete spiral. So here he is, trying to sneak into the gym, just so he can throw around balls by himself for a couple of hours. 

“Tobio.” 

As if a chemical reaction, his body instantly goes cold again when he hears the voice. He feels his heart pick up, thrumming against his ears, and all he wants to do is sink into the floor. 

This time, though, he turns around. 

Miya is standing about eight feet away, in his practice clothes and with his gym bag slung behind his back. He’s not smiling; an even expression is splayed across his face. 

“The gym’s closed.” Kageyama replies curtly. He grips his own strap, just to give his hands something to do. 

“Yeah, they told us. I wanted to talk to you, actually. Figured you’d be trying to break in.”

“Don’t act like you know me.” The reply shoots out of his mouth like venom. 

Something in Miya’s face shifts, and it makes him look more sombre. His eyes go wide with surprise, and he flashes out his palms in defence. “Okay. But will you hear me out? I keep seeing you around, and I know things with us ended...” 

_Awfully. Cruelly. Made-me-cut-you-out-of-my-life-to-keep-sane-ly._

“...on uncertain terms.” 

“There was nothing uncertain about it, Tsumu.” 

Miya purses his lips and nods. “I’m sorry if you were hurt by anything I did. We were just kids, you know? We had no idea what we were doing.” 

Anger flares in Kageyama’s gut. After all this time, Miya still doesn’t get it. He probably never will. “What do you want?” 

Miya sighs and stuffs his hands in his pockets. “Do you wanna get a coffee? There’s a shitty hipster one around the corner from here, I think.” 

He’s trying to make a joke, and ironically, it does make Kageyama want to laugh. He imagines Miya, all bite and irony, sitting in the light and serenity of Renaissance. Sapping all the joy out of the place. “I have nothing to say to you.” 

“Come on, Tobio. Hear out what I have to say. Please?” When Kageyama remains silent, Miya presses on. “Okay, how about we just practice?” He pulls out a small bundle of keys from his pocket and jiggles it in the air. “We’ve been practicing in the basketball gym, and I’m the only one with the keys.” He flashes a smile. “What do you say? For old time’s sake.”

* 

Hinata is not registering anything during his final Early Modern Lit class. With his notebook laid open in front of him, all he can do is stare at the clock, waiting for the minutes to pass. 

Thirty-two minutes until class ends. 

Thirty-two minutes until he goes home to finish his last paper, where he and Kenma will have dinner. 

Everyone around him suddenly starts packing up, and he blinks up in confusion. At the front, he sees their professor trying to pack up her stuff before someone comes up to her for questions. Hinata closes his notebook; he didn’t even realize she ended class early. He quickly packs up and leaves the lecture hall. 

Four hours and twenty-eight minutes until he heads to the West Gym. 

* 

“What do you say? For old time’s sake.” 

They stare at each other like that for a long time, neither breaking eye contact. All Kageyama wants to do is crumble. But from everything that’s happened, he feels like he’s wrung out like a cloth; with nothing else left to give, with every inch of his insides splayed out, he somehow feels a tad stronger. “I’ll see you at the game,” he says, turning around and walking away. 

“Is it because of that shrimp?” Even though Kageyama can’t see him, he can sense that Miya’s voice changed. All the good naturedness has been seeped out, as if turned off by a switch. Now, all Kageyama hears is spite. 

He keeps walking, and doesn’t look back. 

Kageyama did want to practice more, before the game. But now, thinking of everything he’s done, everything he put himself through, maybe he doesn’t need anything else. 

* 

Three hours and fifty-nine minutes later, Hinata and Kenma step out of the apartment and into the evening air. 

In the years he’s attended this university, Hinata has never seen such enthusiasm for a volleyball game. You would always feel the buzz in the air, and he was always aware, but now, as they walk towards the gym, the people around them are wearing face paint, t-shirts that had their team logo, and some even chanting in the streets. 

He watches Kenma take out his fancy film camera and take pictures while they walk. “I thought we hate it when people pour too much resources into sports,” Hinata teases. 

Kenma replies as he adjusts the lens. “Learning to sit with these tensions is an important part of living life.” He reaches into his shoulder bag and pulls out a knit scarf with the team colours and logo, wrapping it around his neck. When he continues, he’s smiling. “Also, I know how hard Kuroo and the team worked for this.” 

Hinata can’t help but mirror his smile. He shoves Kenma lightly as they walk, causing him to slightly lose balance. “How gay,” he jokes. 

Hinata stops in his tracks when they reach the gym entrance. Any other day, the double doors are drab and plain. Now, they’re wide open and decorated to the brim. Cannon lights are flashed upwards and the team posters are hung from the top, making it look like the goddamn Superbowl. 

Years ago, it would have made Hinata want to throw up. Days ago, seeing this one giant poster of Kageyama in uniform—with a giant _KAGEYAMA TOBIO, #9: SETTER_ flashing near the entrance like he’s some kind of god—would have made him want to turn around and go home. And Kenma would have let him. 

He feels Kenma take his hand. “Ready?” He asks. 

Hinata takes a deep breath, smiles at his best friend, and pulls him across the door. “Name drop Kuroo and get us free popcorn.” 

* 

“Do you guys hear that?” Kogane asks, to no one in particular. He’s closing his eyes and holding up a hand like he’s trying to summon spirits. 

Everyone else laughs and ignores his question, focusing on getting changed and ready for the game. Kageyama closes his locker and steps towards him. “I don’t hear anything.” 

“It’s the sound of anticipation! The sound of victory!” He hooks an arm around Kageyama’s shoulders and stretches out his fist. Suddenly, he leans forward and drops his voice. “Oh, and don’t worry about your performance during that last practice, Kageyama-san. It’s just nerves, I totally get it.” 

Kageyama suddenly wants this conversation to end. “Okay, thanks.” 

Kogane tightens his grip on his shoulder. “No, I’m serious. I’m rooting for you. I’m sure those missed sets were just a fluke. But, of course, I want you to know that I’m ready to step in. So, I got your back. Do what you need to do, you know? And don’t worry about the crowd. Tune them out if you have to.” 

This is probably the longest conversation he’s ever had with Kogane, and it’s pure agony for Kageyama to acknowledge that he’s right. He’s continued to fuck up in practices leading up to the game, failed to focus and keep in time with his spikers, and somehow resorting to faster and faster sets that ultimately fall to the ground. He would rather swallow a tire than sit on the bench for this game, but a small part of him is grateful for Kogane’s words. Emphasis on _small_.

“Thank you, Kogane,” Kageyama replies. 

“Everyone ready?” Kuroo yells out. The room is suddenly bursting with yells, whoops, clangs of lockers being slammed shut. 

“Let’s do this!” Yamamoto yells. 

“Alright, alright. Behave.” Kuroo sneers, and the energy suddenly turns electric. “But let’s show these motherfuckers how it’s done, huh?” The whole room erupts. 

Kuroo opens the door, and from where Kageyama’s standing, he can already hear the roaring of the crowd. 

Kageyama makes it through warmups and greetings with minimal problems. Ignoring Miya and his team on the other side of the gym was relatively easy. He still doesn’t feel a hundred percent, and he’s still trying to fight the haziness and tension settling in his brain, but it’s fine. This is fine. The coin toss decides that their team is serving first, and so he walks past the endline and prepares to deliver his serve toss. 

When he hears the whistle and takes a breath, throwing it high up in the air, his mind eases. Just a little. _He can do this._

It’s not like anyone important is watching. 

*

Surprise number one: watching volleyball from the stands, high up and away from the bench, is fun. A little painful, still. But fun. He loves to watch the ball and predict the players’ movements. He loves experiencing the thrill of a point. He’s forgotten that. 

Surprise number two: even with previous expectations, watching Kageyama play knocks Hinata breathless. 

Watching Kageyama playing volleyball, with all the skill and talent and technique that he’s built up in his own imagination, with all the skill and talent and technique that he never got for himself, is like...like... 

Like watching a work of art. 

The envy he was dreading to take over—the despair over what he could have had—it never comes. Hinata’s eyes are glued to his every move. To his stance, to his jumps, to the hand signals he flashes to the rest of his team. It’s everything he loved about volleyball—all his addiction, obsession, absolute devotion—rolled into this person who liked to hold his hand and read his books and listen to his writing. 

He suddenly wants, so badly, to reach out and touch him. 

He’s so laser focused on watching Kageyama’s hands, his speed, the precision of his movements, that he doesn’t register something that Kenma is saying. “What was that?” Hinata asks.

When he looks over at Kenma, his eyes are focused forward. “There’s something wrong.” 

* 

Shit. Fuck. Shit. 

This is the most annoying thing about a complete downwards spiral: knowing it’s happening does jack shit. It doesn’t matter if your eyes are wide open. There’s nothing stopping you from falling deeper and deeper. All you can do is watch. 

So that’s what Kageyama does. He watches himself miss an A quick, near the start of the game. He watches himself panic. He misses jump serves that he hasn’t missed in months, his quicks are turning out just _slightly_ off. 

Of course, Miya notices immediately. He aims his jump floaters towards him, causing him to stumble and lose balance. He’s so afraid of Miya reading his setups that he slips into high, simple tosses. 

Pretty soon, before Kageyama really knew it, the first set was over. 25-17. 

* 

It’s hard for Hinata to make out what their coach is saying to them on the bench, but he doesn’t look happy. Neither does their captain. “Kuroo looks mad,” he says to Kenma. He’s forgotten what Kuroo’s like when he’s pissed—how _scary_ he can be. 

“He’s stressed.” Kenma replies. 

Hinata hums, and moves his attention to Kageyama. 

His foot is tapping anxiously against the floor. 

* 

When Kageyama goes for the jump serve at the start of the second set, he knows he’s barely keeping it together. Point after point, as he tries to force himself into settling down, into _fucking focusing_ , he slips further away. 

When he misses the second toss in a row, Kageyama braces himself on his knees. He blinks at the floorboards, trying to catch his breath in the few seconds he has. The room is starting to spin a little. He feels his throat closing. 

From the corner of his eye, he sees his coach call Kogane to the bench.

They’re gonna pull him out. Just like high school, all over again.

When the serve toss goes up on the other side of the net, he feels his pulse start to pick up. He gets one more play, and he has to make it count. B quick. He watches the ball fly to their side. The receive is off. He runs and falls back, body naturally contorting into form. He gets a glimpse of the crowd. Everything is in slow motion, which is how he was able to see it. 

Him. 

The orange hair is a dead giveaway. He thanks the gods he’s fallen for with someone he can spot so easily in a crowd. 

It’s ridiculous; how radically his body changes when seeing Hinata. His back relaxes as if a valve has whistled off. The ball falls towards him in slow motion, and his time, he feels completely in control. It fits comfortably against his fingers, and he delivers the toss straight to Yamomoto’s hand mid-air. It lands right on the end line. The whistle blows, and Yamomoto yells in triumph. 

But now, with the gameplay paused, Kageyama is barely aware of what’s happening on the court. All he can focus on is Hinata, standing up from his seat, looking straight at him with the loveliest eyes he’s ever seen. 

When they look at each other like that, dozens of meters apart, Kageyama’s legs start to move. Forwards, towards the steps leading up from the stands. 

Hinata does the same.

He’s terrified Hinata will disappear and slip between his fingers again, so he doesn’t look away. Which, of course, causes him to trip over a bunch of water bottles lined up on the floor. He stumbles and catches his balance, and he sees Hinata’s face break into a laugh. 

That makes him run. He needs to touch him, to hold him, to apologize to him. Right now. 

He reaches the bottom of the steps, and runs up to Hinata’s row. At the back of his mind, he can sense that people are trying to get his attention, calling out his name and even trying to wave their hands in front of his face, but that is far back in his brain. Anything he can focus on is _Hinata, Hinata, Hinata._

He can see that Hinata’s still trying to snake his way through the seats, apologizing as annoyed people get up to let him pass through. Kageyama shifts his feet in anticipation. He’s impatient, he’s antsy, he can’t wait to— 

“Tobio!” Hinata breaks from the row and barrels towards him, throwing his arms around Kageyama’s neck. 

Once again, he’s stumbling. Hinata has that effect on him—knocking him to the ground, throwing him off his balance. And Kageyama will happily keep falling. 

“Shouyou,” he whispers. His hands automatically make their way to Hinata’s hair, tangling his fingers with orange tufts. He says his name like it’s forbidden; as if everytime he says it, he’s defying every single rule. “Shouyou.” 

Hinata pulls away, gripping Kageyama’s face with both hands. He wonders how long he can look into his eyes, bright and beautiful, without getting tired. “I’m sorry. All this time, we never once talked about this part of your life, or...or _any_ part of your life, and I pushed you, and I almost lost you, and..I’m sorry, Tobio.” 

All Kageyama can do, while listening to him speak, is run his hands along his face, down his neck, across his shoulders. Kageyama shakes his head when Hinata finishes. “I’m the one who’s supposed to apologize right now, remember?. _You’re_ the one angry at me, you idiot. You just stole all my lines.” His voice, he realizes, is coming out broken. But he’s way past the point of pathetic when it comes to Hinata. 

“Tobio,” Hinata says. When he looks up at Kageyama, he can see that his eyes are welling up. His hands shift beneath them, and Kageyama sees that from his pocket, Hinata pulls out a bundle of papers, now neatly folded into a compact pile. “I read your poems.” 

Kageyama feels his eyes widen. “What?” 

Hinata smiles nervously, but tears are now flowing down his face. “I read them, and re-read them, and...you’re an idiot, you’re the stupidest fucking boy on earth, and...” 

* 

Hinata will write him an elegy. A symphony. A five-act epic. If this is what his English degree will get him, Hinata will get a fucking doctorate. He will do anything to try and pour his soul into Kageyama’s hands, the way that Kageyama has done for him. 

For now, all he can do is kiss him. 

* 

At the back of his mind, he wonders if Kuroo was responsible. Probably. He has no idea how, and his brain doesn’t know how, but probably. But his b lol rain doesn’t know how to be embarrassed about any of this. 

More importantly, his brain is too preoccupied with Hianta’s hair. Hinata’s shoulders. Hinata’s trembling hands, ghosting their way across Kageyama’s face. 

Even more importantly, his brain is too preoccupied with the joy, the _bliss_ , coursing through him in a way he’s never experienced. 

_“Oi! Kageyama!”_ He freezes when he hears Kuroo’s voice, loud and commanding, boom from the benches. 

He feels the vibrations of Hinata’s chuckle. He fists Kageyama’s shirt, and gives him a final peck on the cheek. “Go,” he whispers in his ear. “We’ll talk about this after you win.” 

Kageyama feels himself frown. “Are you sure?” 

Hinata actually laughs. “ _Yes, stupid._ Go!” He slaps him on the back and pushes him away. 

Kageyama takes his hand and kisses it. “You’ll stay and watch?” 

Hinata gently pulls his hand away to run it through Kageyama’s hair. “I’ll stay and watch,” he repeats. 

_“Kageyama!”_

They both flinch when Kuroo’s voice erupts across the room. With a final nod, Kageyama runs down towards the court. “Tobio!” he hears Hinata shout. He turns around to look at him. “Relax your shoulders! And don’t forget to take your time, okay?” 

He sees a few people chuckle from the stands, and Kageyama can’t help but smile. “I will.” 

“Win this fucking game!” He hears Hinata shout. When he cheers, the whole crowd cheers with him. 

When he steps back into the court, he looks back at the stands. And he does it again. And again. 

Each time, Hinata was there.


	11. epilogue

Other than the seedy bathroom on the sixth floor of the library, Deadline is Hinata’s most hated place on campus.

But now, with his person next to him, frowning while trying to sip at the foam of his beer, it’s not so bad. 

The whole table erupts when Kuroo enters the bar, holding a giant trophy on one hand. Kenma follows right behind him. “Ladies and gentlemen,” Kogane yells. “The captain of the prefecture men’s volleyball champions, bound for Spring Nationals for the first time in a decade!” This time, when the table cheers louder than a concert stadium, Hinata feels his ears pop. 

“Look at her, boys! Freshly engraved.” He smacks it on the table, pulls out a chair for Kenma, and finally plops down on his own seat. “Who’s ready to get fucking wasted?” 

Him and Kageyama look at each other when the guys give another round of yelling. Hinata’s already opening his mouth to talk to Kuroo, when Kuroo cuts him off. “No, you two are not leaving yet. You will not leave with our star setter at ten fucking pm.” He claps his hands before they can say another word. “Shots!” 

They do shots. They laugh, and listen to Taketora’s stories, and participate in yelling. 

When he sees Kageyama’s head start to sway from side to side, he smiles and pokes him in the cheek. “Hey,” Hinata whispers. 

“Hey.” His eyes are barely staying open. 

“You wanna get out of here?” 

His head bobs again and falls forward onto Hinata’s shoulder. “That was a nod, by the way.” 

Hinata laughs. “Roger that.” 

He fights through the series of protests and complaints from the table when he and Kageyama start to get up. Hinata makes eye contact with Kenma, who just gives him a smile and nuzzles back into Kuroo’s shoulder. Sleepy drunks, Hinata idly decides, are his favourite people. 

“Okay, okay, we’re gonna leave,” Hinata tells the rest of the table, waving them off with a hand. “I’ll bring him to practice in one piece on Monday.” 

“You better!” Kogane slurs. His whole body is leaning on the table, and he points his finger directly at Hinata. “And you better take care of him, or I’ll _fucking kill you._ ” 

Kuroo pats him on the head. “Atta boy, Kogane. You tell him.” He looks back at Hinata and gives him a crooked smile. “Text me when you’re home, yeah?” 

Hinata gives him a salute, waves a final time, and pulls Kageyama out of the bar. 

When the night air hits them, Hinata relishes the cold air flowing into his lungs. “Are you drunk?” He asks Kageyama. 

“What?” Kageyama blinks up at him. “No, I barely had anything. I’m just really sleepy.” 

Hinata laughs, and he feels whole body light up. “Okay, let’s take you home.” 

He feels Kageyama grip him tightly around the waste. “You’ll stay with me?” 

“If you want.” 

“I want.” 

They walk in silence for a few steps before Hinata speaks again. “Hey,” he starts, a grin forming on his face. “I have something new for you.” 

Kageyama looks at him, already on the same page. “Yeah?” 

“Yeah.” 

“Will you read it for me now?” 

“No way. Not when you’re barely awake.” 

“Tomorrow, then.” 

“Tomorrow,” he confirms. “I think it’s my best one.” He’s spent the most time on this one—just sitting in his back pocket. He’s currently about thirty poems deep, and is still yet to be satisfied with any of them. “But I will write the perfect one eventually. And I will beat you.” 

“Those poems were shit and unfinished,” Kageyama says for the millionth time. 

And for the millionth time, Hinata says he’s wrong. “They were not. They’re my all-time favourites, and you can’t question my opinion on this. I’m the English major here, remember?” 

“I thought we were discussing poems that _you_ are writing for _me._ ” 

Hinata huffs. “We were.” 

“Good. They’re poems for me, and so what I say is correct. You can’t question the muse.” 

Hinata bites his lip to hide a smile. Here he is, walking hand in hand with his beautiful, gifted, idiot prodigy boyfriend, not knowing what he did to deserve this. There’s so much about him that he still can’t capture with words, or stanzas, or couplets, or metaphors. Piles and piles of papers will prove this. But that doesn’t mean he’ll stop trying. 

There’s so much about him he doesn’t know. So much about him he still can’t grasp. There’s so much about _him_ , about his own self and purpose and fears, that he’s still building. And re-building. And re-re-rebuilding. He has no idea how any of it will unfold. Of what’s up ahead. And Hinata is realizing, more and more, inch by tedious inch, that that’s okay. 

It’s the best part, actually. They get to figure it out together.

**Author's Note:**

> 🚨 long and indulgent A/N alert 🚨
> 
> If I were to list out every single piece of inspiration and influence that made this work come alive, it would take up a whole fic length by itself. But there are two sets of Haikyuu fics that I absolutely must include here. If you liked this work and have not read these works, WHAT ARE YOU DOING GO READ THESE RIGHT NOW: 
> 
> [where the night goes](https://archiveofourown.org/works/4711349) \+ [new things in an old language](https://archiveofourown.org/works/5128619/chapters/11800316) by bigspoonnoya: these were masterclasses in mature, post-canon, and slow burn kagehina. The melancholy and vibrating joy is second to none 
> 
> [Conquering the Great King](https://archiveofourown.org/works/3301085/chapters/7209029) \+ [How Kuroo Found Kenma](https://archiveofourown.org/works/3988276) by SuggestiveScribe: whereas the above works are my kagehina north stars, these works taught me how to love and write kuroken 
> 
> Without [kareofbears](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kareofbears/pseuds/kareofbears), this fic would simply not exist. 
> 
> [The Ben Platt song](https://open.spotify.com/track/6hYvw3LLTViP2mT4MpDNmT?si=NbFlszFuT4y7aDSAJLQtCw) that nourished and watered this story. I knew from the very beginning that I wanted to title this work after this song. 
> 
> And lastly, thank you to every single person who has read this. This fic is the result of many many many hours of my musing and thinking and dreaming, and I’m so glad to share it. 
> 
> comments/kudos would be a dream, and please say hi/reblog this fic on [my tumblr](https://mildkatfics.tumblr.com/) if you'd like.
> 
> take good care x


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